FateKaleidoscopic Demigod
by A New User
Summary: Miyu Emiya wishes to see the ocean. However, she never gets that wish in her home world. When the wish of her brother has for the Holy Grail sends her to another world, instead of going to a world where she meets a red-eyed white haired little girl, magi, and a talking magical wand, she is sent to a world where she will meet a teenager who is born to the sea. Fate Kaleid/PJO cross.
1. Chapter 1

**Well, here is the revised version of the first chapter. I tried to fix some stuff up, namely the past and present tenses.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own Fate/stay night or Percy Jackson and the Olympians. They belong to Type-Moon and Rick Riordan respectfully.**

* * *

A long time ago, there was a cave on a mountain, which an ancient dragon once dwelled. The dragon is gone now, and in its place is the center of an elaborate ritual. The center of the ritual, a young girl wearing a long black dress, was lying on a stone bed. A sophisticated runic array was sprawled around her, ready to begin the ritual. The girl was crying.

Kneeling next to her, a Japanese teenager held her hand. He won. Now he could wish for anything he desires. Unimaginable riches. Godlike power. The survival of the human race, what his father and friend would have wanted.

However, he denied all of that. All those wishes were nothing next to her.

The boy started chanting,

" **I wish upon the Holy Grail"**

" **I pray you find a world where you won't have to suffer any longer"**

" **I pray that you meet kind people"**

" **I pray that you can find friends you can laugh with"**

" **I pray you find a small warm share of happiness."**

As he spoke, the ritual began. The runic array lit up, and burst into action. Light flooded the chamber, blinding both the girl and the boy. The girl, along with the entire runic array started to float up into the air, where more magical arrays appeared both above and below them. As the ritual worked its Mystery, the boy walked away.

Moments later, a flash appears in the sky's above the mountain. The girl disappears without a trace.

* * *

Kaleidoscope, the Magic of Operation of Parallel Worlds. It is an appropriate name, for the different worlds are as varied as the differing colors and patterns in a kaleidoscope. There are worlds where human history is at their strongest, worlds where vampires trump human history, a worlds stuck in the middle is a mysterious way. Some worlds find humans to be the center of action. Others the human race facing certain extinction.

In another universe, that wish the boy made would send the young girl to a world where she would meet and become friends with two talking magical sticks, two magi, and very importantly, a red-eyed, white haired child that had a normal life in every sense of the word. However, this is not that universe, so the girl is sent to somewhere...different. Somewhere where the Earth is in the exact opposite condition of the world she lived in. Somewhere where the Gods are still roaming the mortal world. Somewhere where she can see the ocean with her own two eyes for the first time in her life. Somewhere where human extinction isn't imminent and the earth has many peaceful years ahead of it to flourish...

Percy Jackson's eyes snapped awake. He got up suddenly, panting and sweating heavily. The teenage boy with raven black hair and sea green eyes was in Cabin Three of Camp Half-Blood, the Greek Demigod camp located on Long Island Sound. Percy immediately checked the time. The clock on the wall read 5:30. He then looked around himself to make sure nothing was wrong. Messy cabin? Check. Cherry Coca Cola bought from the Stoll brothers? Check. Tyson in the bunk next to his snoring? Triple check. It looked like he was still in his room.

It was the winter after the Second Gigantomachy. It was four months after the Seven defeated Gaea and saved the world. For the time being, everything was looking up for all demigods, regardless whether they were Greek or Roman. Camp Half Blood and Camp Jupiter have put aside their differences and are looking towards partnership. It was finally deemed safe for regular demigod quests to begin again, which hadn't been allowed in Camp Half Blood since Luke's failed quest. Memberships for both camps were increasing at a rapid pace. Life is back to normal, or at least as normal a demigod life would be.

Life for Percy has also resumed somewhat. It was difficult though. Over the past year, he has missed half a semester of high school. As a result of that, he was unable to understand anything his teachers were teaching him after the Gigantomachy ended. It got better since his return, due to his stepdad, Paul Blofis, a teacher at his High School, and his girlfriend Annabeth tutoring him quite oftenly. Not like it made his junior year of highschool any easier. The workload was really...anyway, back on topic.

Percy just woke up from a dream. Now, this would seem normal, except he is a demigod. Demigod dreams tend to be well...kind of magical. A good portion of Percy's dreams were (accidental) spying on Kronos or Gaea's plans, warnings or messages from both friends and enemies, and the occasional random happening in the mythological world, ranging from nymphs talking about the most random subjects like which satyr they liked the best to the gods having petty arguments with each other. The problem with these dreams however, is that as dreams, demigods usually have trouble recalling they exactly dreamed about. Now that Cabin Fifteen, the cabin belonging to the children of Hypnos, the god dreams, has been established, campers often go there to try and "remember" what they dreamt about.

However, the dream Percy just had was...weird, even going by his standards it, which were saying something, as he dreamt of voices in voids, his enemies talking about killing him, and even a dream about Daedalus and his son, Icarus, getting locked up in his labyrinth after the death of the Minotaur, an event that happened almost three millennia ago. But tonight, all he remembers was a giant pillar of light reaching the heavens appearing over Manhattan. By itself, a pillar of light appearing would deserve a raised eyebrow over almost any figure related to the mythological world. But what turns it from merely noteworthy to jaw dropping is the _scale_ of it. The base of the pillar of light was at least three times as wide as the Empire State Building, and seemed to have no top, extending to the heavens with no end in sight.

"Percy?"

Percy turned his head. Tyson's large eye in the middle of his skull stared back at him. Tyson woke up. He is Percy's half-brother. He is also a Cyclops. As a Cyclops, Tyson is much larger, taller, and stronger than a full grown adult man. He is also Percy's little brother. Percy met him in 7th grade, at the age of 13. At the time, he didn't know back then that Tyson was his brother. Hell, he didn't even notice that Tyson had a singular eye for an entire school year, until Annabeth told him to really look at him. How did he not notice? Well, that is another matter altogether. Anyway, when he found out that Tyson was his brother, Percy was initially bitter, moody, and was a little demeaning towards Tyson. Despite their rough starts though, Tyson and Percy were now close friends and brothers. Over the years, Tyson eventually became a general of the Cyclops army, under the command of their father, the sea god Poseidon. This winter was one of the few breaks Tyson was allowed to come to Camp Half Blood to hang out with Percy.

"Percy, what's wrong?"

"Nothing, I'll tell you in the morning," replied Percy after thinking for a second. It would be better to everybody about his dream later, when it wasn't still dark out. Yeah, that would be the best option, he thought, as he drifted back to sleep….

* * *

"PERCY!"

Percy snapped awake for the second time in the night, and promptly hit his head on the bunk above his. Wincing at the pain and wishing he still had the Curse of Achilles invincibility, he checked his surroundings again. It was still dim inside the cabin, but now the door to his cabin was open. The clock on the wall now read 6:15. And standing next to his bunk was a tall teenager with blue eyes and blond hair. It was Jason Grace. Jason was his sixteen year old cousin, a son of Jupiter. He was in a large orange sweater with the words "CAMP HALF BLOOD" written on the front and sweats. Percy noted that unlike him who was exhausted from the war game the day before, Jason seemed perfectly awake and alert, despite the time.

Romans and their preparedness.

"Chiron wants to see the cabin counselors," said the tall blond demigod. He then started walking back to the door of his cabin.

Percy sat up from his bed, rubbing his head from the injury before, and asks, "What for?"

Jason stopped at the doorway to his cabin, and turned around. From the moonlight, Percy could see a small frown on his face. "Dunno. Get up so Chiron can tell us." Jason then turns around to walk out of Cabin Three before closing the door behind him.

"Percy? What's going on?" asked the Cyclops sleeping on the bunk next to his.

"Just an early counselor's meeting. Don't worry about it Tyson, go back to sleep."

* * *

Just like the last meeting, the senior counselors were gathered around the Ping-Pong table in the rec room of the Big House. It has been a while since the last war council, but the atmosphere of the room was not unlike the tension at the last war council before the Battle of Olympus. Actually, scratch that, from what Percy heard, the war council met several times when he was abducted by Hera to discuss the war against the Giants and Camp Jupiter.

Most of the counselors were dressed in casual attire. The leader of the Roman exchange campers, Bobby, came in a purple toga, and was trying, and failing, to look as dignified as possible among the rest of the counselors. Sniggers from the other counselors could be heard whenever he turned his back. Will Solace of Cabin Seven and Nico di Angelo of Cabin Thirteen were having an animated conversation with the Stoll Brothers, no doubt up to no good. Jason Grace of Cabin One, Piper Mclean, his girlfriend, of Cabin Ten, and Leo Valdez of Cabin Nine were arguing over something ridiculous again, perhaps the plans for explosive rounds made up of Imperial Gold going on the new ships the camp was constructing. Clovis of Cabin Fifteen was sleeping, while Butch Walker of Cabin Fifteen was trying to fit pencils in his nose again, with a growing crowd. Mr. D was sitting in a recliner in the corner of the room drinking Diet Coke while reading a newspaper.

All the chatter came to a halt when Chiron walked to the head of the table and called everyone to attention.

"Now, counselors, I know you guys are wondering what is going…."

"Yeah, about time somebody told me what is going on!" interrupted a loud voice. "Some people like to get their sleep in the morning and not get dragged-"

"Leo, be quiet," said an exasperated Piper in a voice laced with charmspeak. "Just let Chiron finish what he is saying."

Leo, as if commanded by a god, immediately shut his open mouth, no doubt just about to exclaim something else that would interrupt or prolong the meeting. The other campers were evidently affected by the charmspeak as well, since Chiron now had everyone's undivided attention.

"Now," Chiron continued, "If no one is going to interrupt me," Chiron shifted his stern gaze to Leo, and then back to the rest of his audience, " I want to show you guys something that has just happened." Chiron picked up the bronze goblet on the snack table and splashed the water in it onto the hot plate where we would usually melted nacho cheese on. The water evaporated, creating a fine mist over the hot plate, which created a rainbow from the rays reflected by the lights in the room. Chiron picked up a golden drachma, the currency of the gods, tossed it into the rainbow, and spoke, "O Iris, Goddess of the Rainbow, show us the lights over Manhattan this morning. "

The mist shimmered. Soon enough, the mist played like an old projector and showed the campers a view of Manhattan from Olympus, or more specifically, a zoomed up portion of Central Park and the surrounding blocks.

Suddenly, there seemed to be an distortion in the image, but as Percy looked at the image again, he noticed that the Mist, the supernatural force that separates the mythological world from the mundane, was actually distorting inside the image. Next to the reservoir, at the central grassy area of Central Park, a circle of light became visible. The circle of light became brighter, until it is clear that it wasn't just a circle. The image zoomed in, and everyone takes a closer look at the circle. It was around 15 meters across, and was made up of many smaller circles and symbols. Before Percy could really study the entire circle, the circle suddenly lights up even more, blurring the image and making any symbols indecipherable.

A few seconds later, A pillar of light appears where the circle was. Percy's jaw dropped, an action shared by many in the room. It was the pillar of light from his dream! But what did it mean? There weren't another threat to the gods out there, are there? No, from his talks with Annabeth, defeating Gaea and her giants removed the last major opposition to the rule of the Olympian Gods, unless the Titanomachy somehow started up again, or foreign gods decided to attack, and those were close to impossible to actually occur. So what was this?

The Iris-message started shaking and started to short out in random bursts until static ruled the image. A few seconds later, the static cleared up, and we got a view of….Manhattan from a bird's eye view with no pillar of light in sight, with a dark spot in the snow where it previously was. Having played the entire video, the Iris-message dissipated.

For a second, no one said anything. After a tense pause, Travis spoke up, "Okay, I'll bite, what in Hades was that?"

Over two dozen pairs of eyes looked up to Chiron expectantly. It was natural. Chiron has been teaching heros for millennia, and has experienced virtually anything that the demigods might have to go through. He has taught tens of thousands of demigods, and has always been a source of knowledge and good advice to everyone in the room.

However even Chiron's vast knowledge failed them. Chiron looks at the assembled demigods and said, "I don't know, and neither do the gods," while looking at Mr. D.

Mr. D is short for Dionysus, the god of wine. He was sent to Camp Half Blood as director for half a century as a punishment for pursuing an off limits wood nymph. He was recalled after the Giant threat, but was reinstated for interacting with demigods during the war with Gaea after the King of the Gods forbade contact with the mortal world. He looked up from his newspaper. "Yup, never seen anything like it and Zeus, being the caring father he is, wants me, the god stuck in the mortal world, to tell him what is going on." Thunder boomed in the distance, but as usual, everyone ignored it. "Now send a group of you godlings to tell us just what is going on." Mr. D then goes right back to reading his newspaper, looking completely bored and uncaring about anything that is going on.

Seeing that Mr. D. is done speaking, Chiron resumed talking. "The best way for us to find out what is going on is to send a group of heroes to check up to see just what is going on."

Will Solace speaks up, "Well, we should send in a demigod that is intimately familiar with the area. Said demigod would be able to have a better idea of where to find whatever it is we are trying to find."

Every single demigod looked at me. Well, it wasn't a surprise; I did live in Manhattan, and led the camp to defend it during the Battle of Olympus. I spoke up, "I'm in. Plus, since whatever is happening is near the reservoir, I can use my powers to protect myself if necessary. Anyone else wants to go?"

"Well," began Annabeth, "we don't know if whatever there is hostile or dangerous. In that case, we should send our best negotiator." That, left unsaid, was Piper.

"Sure," replied the 16 year old daughter of Aphrodite. Piper was one of the Goddess' daughter born with the ability to Charmspeak, which allows her to persuade others. With it, she can often sound more convincing than she really is and even convince deities to be more lenient. She didn't like the power though, because apparently she thinks it's kind of unfair and mean to whoever she used it on. In addition, anyone who had any training under users of magic were able to detect it and call her out on it. It breeds distrust to those able to use it. Piper herself was a great person, and everyone knew it, so she didn't have that problem.

Percy nodded. That's a good idea. Furthermore, he was good friends with Piper, and could work together with her. "Okay, that's two people. For the last person, let's take-"

"I'll go."

Heads turned. It was Nico di Angelo who spoke up. Being a child of Hades, he was a natural loner. Even after making all sorts of contributions against Gaea in the war, a good number of the campers still were a little wary of him. It was understandable. Even Jason doesn't feel entirely comfortable around him. After all, when both the Greek and Roman camps suspected each other of existing, Nico already knew about both of them and left them both in the dark when he could've introduce them to each other on good terms. Well, relatively good terms. The Greeks never suspected the Romans of existing in the first place, just vaguely acknowledging Rome as a continuation of the domination of the Greek gods, while the Greeks to the Romans were somewhat mythical: everyone knew about them, but unsure of whether they existed or not. Being the son of the underworld led to him being feared by many of the demigods at camp. Another counselor opened his mouth to object-

"What if you guys get in trouble and have nowhere to run? I can Shadow travel is out of danger if something happens," Nico pointed out. Shadow travel is an ability that the children of Hades and the creatures of the underworld can use. It allowed them to teleport themselves and nearby objects from shadow to shadow.

Will Solace angrily snapped, "Nico, I cannot allow you to go on this mission. You are still recovering!" Nico had recently overused his Shadow-traveling ability to transport a 40-foot tall magical bronze statue half-way around the world with two passengers. Long story short, Will was not allowing Nico to do any of his son of Hades stuff, both as a close friend and a doctor. According to Will, if Nico used his ability any more, he would actually fade away. Like literally, his body would fade away, leaving nothing behind but a spirit. Nico told Percy about the effects of his journey. According to Nico, Reyna, and Coach Hedge, Nico during their quest to return the statue started turning to shadow himself. There was a period in time that they couldn't even physically _touch him_. It is understandable why the demigods who were close to him are reluctant to let Nico do anything, much to Nico's irritation.

However, Nico seemed to think he was perfectly fine. "It's been months! I haven't even been allowed to travel back to the underworld since the war. Besides, I'm only going to use my power once, and that's only if we run into something we clearly can't handle. It's fine, right Chiron?"

Chiron sighed, "Will, it's Nico's choice whether he wants to go or not. He has recovered enough so that he can start using his shadow traveling magic. Sparingly, of course."

Annabeth nodded her head, "Nico has been resting a long time, and should be able to take a mission. I think Nico should go on this mission." The other demigods in the room replied with grunts of approval. Even Will backed down.

Chiron spoke up again, "Are there any objections for sending Percy, Piper, and Nico to New York to investigate this...phenomenon?" There were no objections, so Chiron declared, "Since there aren't any objections, the rest of you can go.

With that said, the counselor's meeting was over, and the senior counselors were dismissed. A few of the senior campers stayed for a minute to wish their friends luck before leaving.

Annabeth, a gray-eyed blonde daughter of Athena and Percy's girlfriend, walked up to Percy. They hugged each other, and Annabeth said, "Come back in one piece Seaweed Brain," She then laughed and pecked Percy's lips.

Percy laughs in response and replies with, "When have I ever not?"

Annabeth gives him a look that says _you better not_ and walked out of the room, leaving only Percy, Piper, Nico, Mr. D, and Chiron in the room.

"Sir, when do we leave?" Percy couldn't help but ask.

Chiron raised an eyebrow. "You children aren't twelve anymore. Why are you asking me?"

Percy looked at Chiron in confusion, until what Chiron says slaps him in the head. "Oh, so you want us to arrange the transportation ourselves?"

Chiron looked at them. "Well, you guys have been planning your quests all by yourselves for quite a while. I assume you can do things yourselves now." With that statement, he too left the room.

Twenty minutes, a quick breakfast consisting of simple bread and milk (pity they weren't blue), two extra layers of clothing, and a quick stocking of supplies later, the three demigods found themselves on the back of Mrs. O'Leary who was facing the forest, or more specifically an oak tree. Nico and Percy didn't find it anything out of the ordinary, as they have traveled on the back of the tank sized hellhound multiple times. Piper however, was a little apprehensive.

Piper eyed the giant hellhound warily. "You sure this is the best way to get to Central Park?" It was understandable. Piper had shadow traveled before, but the one time she did it was a life and death situation. It didn't feel very comfortable either. And she, like many campers, have been in too many life or death situations that involve a hellhound. She knows it is tame, friendly even, but is still a little uncomfortable around Mrs. O'Leary. "Why can't we just take the Pegasi?"

Nico sighed, "For the last time Piper, the Pegasi hate my guts. Mrs. O'Leary will get us there faster. Having a giant dog would also come in handy just in case we have to fight something."

"Yeah, just chill Piper. Mrs. O'Leary has done this many times. Haven't run into any walls or ended up in China yet." That comment didn't reassured Piper one bit, but she just sighed and resigned herself to the boys' recommended mode of travel.

Percy patted Mrs. O'Leary's head. "Ok girl, we've done this several times already. Can you take us to the Great Lawn in Central Park, New York?"

Mrs. O'Leary perked her ears up on the sound of their destination. She lifted her snout and sniffed the air a few times, as if to locate their destination. The massive hellhound then looked into the forest, and ran into the shadows of a large oak tree.

Shadow traveling was odd, and hard to describe. It happened seemingly instantly and yet still felt like it took a lot of time. For those more experienced in it, they generally suffer little side effects by the cold, chills down the spine, and weird noises during shadow traveling.

The demigods came out of a tree in between the Great Lawn and the Reservoir in Central Park. When Mrs. O'Leary jumped out of the shadows, she curled up and was soon snoring. It was still dark out, and there was light snow covering the ground.

Percy and Nico climbed off Mrs. O'Leary, and helped a still shivering Piper off the giant hellhound.

Piper looked at Percy and Nico. "How do you people stand that?"

Percy shrugged, "It isn't that bad. You get used to it."

Piper glared at Percy, "we are never doing that again."

Nico interrupted the two older demigods in the middle of their arguments. "Guys, let's just look around and if all goes well, we will not have to shadow travel again. The light came from over there, right?" He points to the center of the lawn. "Let's go and check it out."

The group of demigods pulled out their Celestial Bronze, or in Nico's case, Stygian Iron swords and started walking over to the snow covered lawn, with their weapons illuminating their path. Naturally, one of the demigods had to say something to break the silence.

"Well," Percy started, "what do you think we are looking for?"

Piper shrugged, "maybe we can look for traces of that large skybeam?"

Nico frowned. "Skybeam?"

Piper waved her left hand in a dismissive gesture. "You know in those Superhero movies of late, the final battle always has a giant beam of light descending down in the middle of a ruined city with rubble surrounding it?"

Nico looked confused. "Movies show that now?"

Piper and Percy looked at Nico like he grew a second head until Percy figures it out.

Percy said, "Nico isn't as caught up with popular media as of late. He spent most of his time either at the camps or at the underworld. He probably never had the time to watch any movies. Plus, not everyone is as caught up with movies as you Piper." _And he came from the 1940s_ went unsaid, but heard by everyone.

Piper looked a little embarrassed and uncomfortable at that statement. Nico, on the other hand, showed no emotions to Percy's statement.

Piper started walking in front of the two boys as if to try and run from the awkward atmosphere, but then stopped walking. "Guys?"

Percy and Nico stopped walking and shot questioning looks at Piper.

Nico decided to take the hook. "What is it Piper?"

Piper turned around to face them, "I think I found what we are looking for," and pointed directly behind her.

It was hard to see because it was still dark, but the two boys found what Piper spotted.

It started three meters behind Piper. They could vaguely make out a patch of ground darker than the rest. A closer look revealed that there was no snow there, but an expanse of dark grass. The area with no snow was a large circle with a diameter of 15 meters. It looked like one of those pictures people put on the internet as proof of aliens or conspiracies.

Percy broke the silence. "Well, we found it, now what?"

"Maybe we look around now?" said Nico. "Try not to stray too far, and call for help when you're in trouble. Piper, you go along the left side of the circle. Percy, you go on the right. I'll walk through the middle of the circle."

The two older demigods nodded, and went along their assigned paths. Percy found nothing of interest on his route around the circle. He met up with Nico on the other side of the circle.

"Found anything of note?" The black haired teen asked.

"Nothing besides a few twigs," replied Percy. "Where's Piper?"

"Guys? You may want to see this."

Percy and Nico looked at each other, and walked towards Piper's voice. They found Piper kneeling down on the ground, examining something with the light of her dagger. "Come look at this."

There were footprints in the snow. However, they were very small, clearly belonging to a very small individual.

"What do you guys think?" asked Piper when the boys joined her in looking at the footprints.

Nico narrowed his eyes and said, "It looks like the footprints of a small kid," Nico glances at the other demigods, "barefooted."

Piper gasped, "A child? Barefooted in this weather?" It was unlikely. It was the middle of winter, and any child walking around barefoot was certain to get sick, or worse. It was far more likely it was some kind of monster that just happened to have small feet. Piper shook her head as if to forget the possibility that a kid was walking around with no shoes and got up. "C'mon guys, let's check this out."

The group of demigods followed the footprints. The footprints gradually grew closer and closer together.

Piper stopped walking for a second, and points, "What's that?"

The demigods walked close to what Piper was pointing at, and upon seeing what it was, couldn't help but stare at it for a moment.

The demigods were looking at a small girl lying down curled up in the snow. The girl had Oriental features, and pale skin unlike those of most Asians. The girl was also wearing no article of clothing besides a long flowing black dress that looked incredibly thin, and was clearly not keeping her insulated in any way. If anything, the dress looks like something one would wear to an elaborate ceremony. The girl was passed out, but still shivering.

"Well," Piper said, "Now what?"


	2. Chapter 2

**The first chapter turned out better than I expected, but I think I put in too much info dumps and not enough stuff happening or character interactions when I look back on it. The actual plot and writing looks decent to me so far.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own any part of the Nasuverse or Percy Jackson and the Olympians. They belong to Type-Moon and Rick Riordan respectively.**

 _thoughts_

 _emphasis when_ _speaking_

* * *

You and Dad only wanted to use me.

You had no intention of letting me grow up.

You wanted to selfishly use me and discard me.

You and Dad only kept me to try and exploit me

Did you really not care at all?

Am I not your sister?

Am I really just a tool to be used?

If so, then why did you come back?

Why did you take care of me all these years when I became human?

Why did you save me?

Why are you doing all this for me?

Why?

Why?

 **WHY?**

* * *

Miyu woke up to an unfamiliar ceiling. It was blue. _What's going on? Where am I?_

Her body feels really…hot for lack of a better term. She couldn't feel her hands or legs. Everything feels sore. Her nose feels stuffed up, and she couldn't breathe through it. She attempts to blow it, but finds it impossible to move her arms. Her hair feels wet, but it wasn't cold. She is covered neck to toe with blue blankets. They were warm. There was a current of warm air coming from…a heater perhaps? But the heater she remembers she and her brother owning doesn't blow a current of hot air. She tries to turn her head, only to find out she couldn't.

Drowsiness took over her body again, and involuntarily, she closes her eyes and dozed off.

The next time she woke up, it was in the presence of a woman. Miyu was still covered in blankets, but now she feels like she could move her body. She looks around the room. Everything…was blue. The table in the room had blue cloth covering it. The walls were also blue, matching the ceiling. The china pot sitting in the corner of the room had light blue designs on it. Even the couch she was resting on had a dark blue shading.

Her body still feels hot, but not as hot as before. The soreness is still there though. However, it feels diminished. She could feel her limps again, but when she tries to move them, it feels like moving through quicksand. Miyu lets out a quiet sigh of frustration.

The woman in the room hears the almost incoherent sound, and turns around. Miyu found herself looking at a beautiful woman. The woman looks like one of those actors in those movies and DVDs her brother sometimes brought home for her to watch.

The woman had pale skin, almost as pale as hers. However unlike Miyu's, her skin was pale because they were naturally that pale, opposed to never being allowed to leave the house like her big brother and father told her. The woman was clearly in her late forties, but Miyu can't bring herself to describe the woman as old. She had long brown hair with gray streaks mixed in with them, and wore clothing that seem to make her look decades younger than she really is.

The woman smiles, and Miyu notes her sparkling blue eyes that seem to change color every time she moves and the smile that feels as warm as her brother's hugs.

The woman moves to crouch next to her, and asks something indecipherable, " _*****, *** *** *******?_ " It didn't sound like Japanese. It sounds like that language her brother sometimes practices speaking when she watches Shirou study. English. Yes, it was called English.

Miyu had Shirou read some of his English homework to her sometimes, and she sometimes looked at the books written in English. She can't read it, but she could recognize and identify some of the more simple words.

It seemed like the woman was asking about how she was feeling. Miyu simply nods. Even doing just that was difficult. _What happened to me? The last thing I remember was falling in the snow_. After that, she found herself here, in this strange room. _I suppose these people found me_.

The woman looks relieved. She moves closer and then places her right hand over Miyu's forehead to…check her temperature? Now that the woman is closer, Miyu caught a whiff of how she smelled. She smelled of sweets, as in not just candy, but like the entire candy store. The woman's face looked concern, but after a moment or two she smiles again, apparently relieved that Miyu was ok.

Miyu didn't understand why, but she feels like this woman is someone she can trust to take care of her.

She turns her head and raises her voice to…tell someone outside the room something?

A couple of seconds later, Miyu could hear heavy footsteps from multiple people. Three more figures appeared in the room from the doorway in which the woman turned her head towards.

They were an odd group. There were three teenagers. One of them, the one with the most peculiar green eyes and windswept black hair looked about the same age as her brother. He had an easygoing smile and looked at her sympathetically, as if he understands how she is feeling. He wore an Orange T shirt with "**** Half *****." Miyu couldn't understand the last word.

The second one looked a bit younger than the first one. Miyu couldn't identify her complexion or her features. She was really pretty, beautiful even, but in an all natural way with little makeup. She had startling eyes. Her eyes were always changing color, from purple, to red, to green, to black, and so forth, almost as if she couldn't decide on what color to choose. She had long brown hair with a white feather of a large bird braided in her hair for some reason. The girl was also carrying a bundle of clothing. Are those for Miyu? Miyu was suddenly conscious to the fact that she wasn't wearing any clothing under the layers.

The last person in the group stood out from the other two. He was wearing… black. A black jacket, black shirt, black jeans, black hair, black eyes, if he didn't have incredibly light skin, Miyu wouldn't have seen any but black. His very presence seems to darken the room and triggered an instinctual feeling in Miyu to flee immediately. He looked at Miyu in a very calculating manner, almost like he could see right through her skin and into her soul. And, Miyu had to blink her eyes, there was a incredibly dangerous looking black sword hanging from his belt.

The older boy and girl walked closer to Miyu. They looked concerned. The girl then spoke. "*****, ** **** ** *****, *** **** ** *****. ***** *** **** ** **** ** *** *** ***?" Miyu instantly flinched. _There are prana in her words!_ The words seem to be some kind of compulsion, but the words didn't seem to have any effects at all. Were they trying to steal her? Her family and the Ainsworths said that there are many different groups that would like to use her. Is this another one of them?

The girl saw Miyu flinch at the sound of her voice, and frowns. The three teenagers and the woman talked for a bit, and the two boys stepped out of the room. The woman and the girl turned their attention back to Miyu. The girl placed the clothing on the table in front of her, and the woman placed one of her hands under Miyu's back and the other on her shoulder. Instantly, Miyu understood what was going on. They were going to dress her!

* * *

That was one of the most embarrassing moments in Miyu's life. She has been able to dress herself for the past four years except for the few times she asked her older brother to do her hair or to pick out clothing. However, that was her brother. These were two females that Miyu never knew before. Heck, Miyu doesn't even have any memories of any interactions between her and females ever before being captured by the Ainsworths. Miyu also didn't like the gleam in the girl's and woman's eyes when they were dressing her. It made her feel like one of the dress-up dolls that she see on the magazines that her brother brings her.

In the end, Miyu felt completely violated and exposed, and the two grinning females next to her didn't help matters. The little girl was now wearing a pair of pink sweatpants, white socks, a pink shirt with the same cat that the other girl wore, and a fluffy pink jacket.

The young teenage girl, still smiling, walked out of the room, presumably to call her friends back into the room. When she came back, the two other teenagers were tailing her. The older boy looked relieved to see that Miyu is in clothing, while the younger one was still looking at her as if she were something that he couldn't quite figure out. Given her true nature, even Miyu wasn't quite sure who she was anymore. Was her entire life just a lie in of itself?

The older boy looked like he wanted to introduce himself. However Miyu didn't understand anything he was saying. Miyu didn't like keeping them in the dark for long though. "Who are you people?" she asked.

Silence. It feels like time simply froze in the room. Nobody spoke for a minute or too.

* * *

After eating a quick…breakfast, (Miyu never asked the time of day, she just assumed it was morning since she just woke up,) the woman that Miyu guessed was a mother ushered them into her car.

The mother drove her four passengars for what feels like forever. She allowed Miyu to sit in the passenger's sit, even though Miyu feels that it would be more appropriate for one of the teenagers to sit there. The three teenagers certainly didn't look very comfortable in the back seats of the Prius. The oldest one with the green eyes certainly looked a little envious of Miyu being granted the seat next to the woman. Perhaps he was the child of the woman sitting next to her? Now that Miyu looked, she could see some family resemblance. The two of them both had the same caring smile.

It became very clear very soon to Miyu that she wasn't in Fuyuki city in Japan anymore. The second she stepped out, Miyu was greeted with the morning sun…and very loud beeping from the horns of hundreds of different cars.

It overwhelmed Miyu: she has never stepped out of her house in her life before _that_ happened. More vehicles than she ever seen in her life were driving right outside the woman's home. High rising skyscrapers dominated the skyline of the city. In the distance, Miyu was able to see the iconic feature of the city, the Empire State Building of New York City.

She was halfway around the world in the city of New York, which was impossible. From what she knew, the New York that she heard about was supposed to be an abandoned city with no survivors as a result of a disastrous plague, not the bustling metropolis in front of her eyes.

15 minutes later in the car, the woman drove her car to a tunnel. Right before they entered, Miyu caught a glimpse at the sea, the place she always read about but never had the chance to see. She didn't look get a really good look, but she could've sworn she caught a glimpse of some kind of sea demon looking back into her eyes.

Everything on the car ride was something new to Miyu, from the radio playing a song that she couldn't understand, to the signs and buildings just outside the window. A lifetime of staying inside didn't allow her to interact with the outside world a lot. However, there were many things that Miyu thought that looked out of place or she thought was a hallucination. Like the shadow that looked like a giant horse, or the ghosts in the cemetery they passed by. The other passengers apparently find it really cute that she would marvel at everything outside. Miyu didn't care, and decided to just enjoy herself.

Around 2 hours into the car ride, the urban areas vanished into the more rural areas of the country. There were more snow outside the city, vast landscapes of it, but Miyu only had eyes for what lied beyond the hills. The ocean appeared to her how it would always appear in her dreams, a vast expanse of blue with no end in sight. Her brother had promised that he would take her to see it, but now he's…he's…back in Fuyuki. He must be so worried about her right now.

Miyu only notices that she was crying when the teenager seated behind her calls out. Miyu turns around to find the younger boy with dark eyes look at her with what seems to be sympathy, like he knows what she is going through. When Miyu looks closer into his eyes, she notices his eyes look off, kind of like her brother's eyes looked the last time she saw him. She wipes off her tears with her jacket's sleeve and looks away.

They stopped about 2 hours and a half after they left. They stopped out at a simple farm road, as far as Miyu could tell. She could see a large house in the distance, a lot of strawberries in the fields, and a rather large pine tree on a tall hill.

The other passengers of the car started getting out, so Miyu decided to mimic their actions. The teenagers started towards the large tree on the hill, and the mother did the same. Confused, but determined not to get left behind, Miyu followed them up the hill.

When they got halfway to the top of the hill, Miyu noticed that hanging from the pine tree's lowest branches was a large clump of fabric made of brilliant Gold. Underneath it was a sleeping…dragon? From what she read, dragons were the apex of all magical species, and possessed enough power to destroy entire cities. Naturally, Miyu took a step back and tripped over her feet to fall with her back to the ground. The other teenagers and the mother saw what she was looking at, and laughed, as if the dragon laying around the tree was no big deal.

The odd group continued up the hill, and Miyu tried her hardest to banish the thought about eaten alive by a large fire-breathing reptile to the back of her mind. However, when they reached the top, Miyu hit her face on something and fell to the ground. She then got back up and moved her hand forward. Her hand was halted in midair, as if there was an invisible wall preventing her from moving forward. A bounded field? The mother was facing the same problem.

The three teens were able to cross the barrier with no problems. The green eyed boy, with a slight look of embarrassment, slapped his forehead as if he forgot something important, and said something that sounded awfully important to Miyu. As soon as the boy finished saying whatever he was saying, Miyu fell forward, now unhindered by the invisible barrier, and stumbled a few feet. Behind her, was the woman, who walked in without the stumble and chuckled a bit at Miyu's clumsy incident. Miyu's face reddened, and she quickly stood back up and raised her head.

She looked up to see a large valley. the valley marched all the way up to the water, which glittered about a mile in the distance. Between here and there, Miyu simply couldn't process everything she was seeing. The landscape was dotted with buildings that looked like ancient Greek architecture-an open-air pavilion, an amphitheater, a circular arena-except that they all looked brand new, their white marble columns sparkling in the sun. In a nearby sandpit, a dozen high school-age kids and satyrs played volleyball in the light snow. Canoes glided across a small lake. Kids wearing orange jackets were chasing each other around a cluster of cabins nestled in the woods. Some shot targets at an archery range. Others rode horses down a wooded trail, and, unless I was hallucinating, some of their horses had wings.

For the first time since the apartment, Miyu opened her mouth, "What is this place?" Her company looked back at her, and the teens had a look of understanding plastered on their faces, as if they could understand what she was thinking. She flushed and felt irritation when they looked at her like that, as if they were purposely holding back information from her, even if she couldn't understand it anyway.

They continued walking to a large, sky blue house. When they got there, the oldest teen directed the rest of the group to the deck, where 2 men were playing a card game? One of the men had bushy eyebrows with thinning brown hair and a long scruffy beard. He was also in a wheelchair. The other man was dressed and looked more pronounced. He had a chubby face with a red nose, and black hair that looked purple in the right light. Despite the cold, he was wearing a leopard-spot Hawaiian shirt in the middle of winter. There was also a stuffed leopard head lying on the table, but Miyu couldn't help but think that its eyes were moving.

The teenagers talked to the two men, while Miyu and the mother just stood there, watching. After a minute or two of conversation, the man with the brushy eyelashes looked at Miyu, as if he was trying to read her mind. Then he spoke, "Hello, are you having a good day?" in perfect Japanese, with a slight accent.

Miyu was so shocked for a moment that someone knew Japanese that it took her a moment before she responded. "Um, it's been fine, I guess," she spoke shyly and nervously.

The man smiles, "My name is Chiron, and what may your name be?"

Miyu thinks for a moment, his name sounded familiar, until it hit her, "Chiron, as in the trainer of legendary heroes?" His name popped up many times in Greek Myths.

The man playing cards with Chiron drawls, in the same language Miyu learned her entire life, "So she knows something. That is better than Peter Johnson here." The teenager with the green eyes scowled at the man, despite not knowing the rest of the sentence. Perhaps Peter Johnson was his name?

Chiron looks at his playing partner, and then back to Miyu with an amused look on his face, "Whether I'm _that Chiron_ is irrelevant, and this isn't about me, this is about you. I'm sure that you will have many questions you want to ask me, but would you please tell us about yourself first?"

Miyu flushed at the reminder to be polite, "My name is Emiya Miyu, but you can call me Miyu, Chiron-san"

"Emiya Miyu," Chiron tested the words in his mouth. "Miyu Emiya, just call me Chiron."

"Do you know if I can get back to Japan? I need to go back." asked the little girl.

Chiron looked at the girl speculatively. "It depends on the circumstances. I don't believe there is any reason why you can't go back. Where are you from in Japan, Miss Emiya?"

"Fuyuki City."

The man playing cards with Chiron suddenly sits up straighter and looks at Miyu, almost forgetting about his card game, unintentionally bleeding and revealing his hand to Miyu and Chiron. "That place doesn't exist."

Miyu turned around, "What are you talking about?"

The man regarded her closely again, "Look girl, I don't know what planet you think you are, but the city named 'Fuyuki' doesn't exist in this world." He then goes back to his card game, seemingly uninterested in the conversation.

Meanwhile, the gears in Miyu's head started turning. What did he mean that Fuyuki didn't exist? Even if that "incident" turned Fuyuki into a ghost town, it didn't warrant it not being on the map entirely, surely. That shouldn't be possible, unless…Oh …OH. Miyu quickly thought back to the wish, ' **I pray you find a world where you won't have to suffer any longer.'** Was it possible that she is another universe entirely? The Holy Grail, herself, is supposed to have the ability to grant any human wish, no matter how big or small, no matter how improbable, if the wisher so desires, it will be granted.

Chiron broke the silence, "So where do you come from, Miyu?"

Miyu wasn't sure how to answer that question. If it became known that she was from another universe, her safety could be compromised. But how should she answer his question? After a few seconds, she reached an answer.

"I prefer to not talk about my past, sir."

Chiron narrowed his eyes, but didn't question it. "So what do you know about the Greek Gods, Miyu Emiya?"

Miyu was confused. What did the Greek Gods have to do with anything? To her knowledge, and most of the population related to the Moonlit World back in her dimension, the Gods have all either been reduced to elementals or escaped to the Reverse side of the world to escape the rise of the Age of Man. Why would the Greek Gods in particular matter at all, unless…Chiron…the sometimes unnatural feel she sometimes felt off the teenagers…the bounded field at the edge of the valley…

"The Greek Gods are still around?" asked the very nervous little girl.

"Got it in one," said the man still playing cards. Miyu was starting to get severely annoyed at him. "That's a first."

Chiron looked at Miyu in surprise, as if he wasn't sure what to expect from her. "Yes. That is the first time in a very long while that I received a serious answer along those lines. Yes, they are still around, and they are very interested in you, Miyu Emiya."

Miyu took a frightened step back. While she can't name any specific myths right now, but having the attention of multiple gods tended to not be a good thing in mythology. After all, humanity is usually the god's favorite playground, messing around with them as they wish. "Why would they ever be interested in me?"

Chiron looked at her again, scrutinizing her, before saying, "At 5:30 this morning, we received reports of a giant pillar of light appearing over in Central Park. We sent a group of demigods to find out what happened, and they found you." Miyu flinched, but didn't say anything. "Are you sure you don't have anything to tell us Miyu?"

Miyu didn't respond for a second. "I don't know what that pillar of light might be. The last memories I had were waking up in a cold park, and walking away until I collapsed."

The man sitting across the table sighed as he places a card on the table, "I suppose that's that. I might as well tell dear old Father the information that I gathered from the event. Looks like my win, Chiron."

"Nope, my score is still higher than yours," replied Chiron as he revealed his cards. "Looks like I win again, Mr. D."

Mr. D sighed as he got up, "I'm never going to beat you am I? Well, I need to go report to Father now, I hope you ingrates suffer while I'm gone." The man started emitting a really intense light, and Miyu had the sense to look away before it got too bright. Mr. D vanished where he was standing before. The stuffed leopard head went with him.

Chiron watched Miyu look at disbelief at where Mr. D previously was sitting. "Was he a god?"

Chiron answered promptly, "Yes, his name is Dionysus, the god of wine. In fact, almost everyone at this training camp has some divine blood."

Miyu couldn't help herself, "Divine blood?"

Chiron chuckled a bit, "Yes, you see, this is a training camp for Greek Demigods. In fact, these three teens," he gestured at the three that apparently found her, "Are three of our most experienced demigods we have."

Miyu opened her mouth. Closed it again. She spoke nervously, "but I'm completely human."

Chiron turned to the demigod with green eyes, Peter Johnson, she remembered, and spoke a little to him in English. A second later, the man had a small ballpoint pen with a cap in his hands. He then uncapped it, and the pen grew into a glowing bronze sword.

The weapon wasn't even incredibly long, maybe only 3 feet long at most from hilt to tip. The actual blade was shaped like a leaf, with an incredibly sharp edge and a leather gripped hilt. It longed very dangerous.

Chiron held the sword in a reverse grip, "Miyu, this sword is made up of a material called Celestial Bronze. It is deadly to demigods and monsters alike, and can even wound gods. However, the metal would be completely unable to harm mortals. They are simply not important enough for the blade to harm. Here is how it is going to work, Miyu. I will apply pressure from the tip of this sword onto part of you skin. If you feel pressure, call out, and you will be confirmed to have divine blood. If not, you will confirm our suspicions about being completely human."

Miyu didn't know what to think. Can she be considered an existence that can be considered human? She might be human now, but the Ainsworths told her she wasn't always one. So would she get hurt from that sword? Taking a gamble, Miyu stretched her right hand onto the table with her open palm facing up.

Chiron took the sword in his hand and placed its tip right above her palm. "You ready?"

Miyu closed her eyes and nodded. She braced herself for the pressure that may or not come. However, she never felt anything. When she opened her eyes again, she bore witness to the sword sticking through her hand.

Chiron looked up from the sword stabbed into Miyu's hand and back into Miyu's eyes. "Well, it looks like you are a hundred percent human, Miyu."

* * *

After that, Chiron dismissed the rest of the people that came with Miyu to their regular everyday tasks. He then jumped out of his wheelchair and turned into a centaur. Miyu freaked out for a minute before calming down. Of course Chiron is a centaur. He was always one in the legends.

Chiron showed Miyu around camp. It truly seemed light an amazing place to stay, even if some activities seemed kind of dangerous.

Thy saw various buildings all with various Ancient Greek designs, like the Amphitheater and the training arena. She was puzzled ambit by the open picnic area, apparently where everyone eats, until Chiron explained to her that the only weather that can pass through the camp borders were those of the Chiron's and Mr. Ds choosing. Now that she thought about it, the sky above Camp Half Blood (Chiron told her the name of the camp) was noticeably clearer than the sky around it.

They went to the training arena, where Miyu saw a teenager in a purple shirt with a golden sword sparring with a camper who was wielding a bronze one. They were pretty evenly matched, and had a crowd cheering and placing bets on them. However, part of the crowd were wearing purple shirts that said something else from the orange shirts the campers wore.

Chiron heard the unasked question before Miyu asked. "Those campers are from our sister camp, Camp Jupiter."

"Isn't Jupiter the Roman name for Zeus? Why would a Greek Demigod camp be named after a roman god?"

"Well, it might be kind of hard to grasp, but the truth is that the gods the adapted to each and every new nation they migrate to that contains the spirit of the west. The gods are located in the country wherever western civilization is the strongest. For the past one or two centuries, that country is he United States. Do you understand?"

Miyu nodded. It kind of made sense, even if she believed that from what she knew gods don't work that way.

"Now, in the ancient times, when Rome rose to power and adopted the Greek Gods, they...changed. Their personalities and domains were altered, and those personalities became a part of Western civilization since you can argue that Rome has the greatest influence over the civilized world. Rome became the center and foothold of the gods, and was civilization in which the influence of the gods were the most profound. Are you following me Miyu?"

Miyu nodded. The talk was confusing her, but she believed she understood the basics.

"Since the gods were extremely important to Rome and vice versa, after Rome fell, demigods split into 2 groups, Greek and Roman. Each of these groups have their own camps. Greeks and Romans didn't really get along, and it's only recently that we started close cooperation. Camp Jupiter's camp color is purple."

Chiron showed Miyu the climbing wall, where campers try to reach the top. It seemed simple, until you consider that the climbing wall had lava pouring down from the top and spinning sections that knock you off the column. Miyu didn't want to try anytime soon, and Chiron agreed with her, and they moved on.

Miyu showed great interest in the archery range. Her older brother practiced Archery, she remembered, but he apparently quit after a few months. According to him, there isn't much point in joining the club when he shot a bulls-eye everytime after his first two tries. Chiron promised that he will show her how to shoot, but she might need to use a smaller bow than the rest of the campers were using.

Chiron then showed Miyu the stables (where Chiron had a perpetual frown) and the javelin range. Miyu really like the Pegasi. They were really friendly and affectionate towards her. A large teenager with a shaved head and a rainbow tattoo on his biceps was watching Miyu interact with the Pegasi. After a minute or two, the teen walked over to Chiron and asked him something. Chiron shook his head and waved the teen off.

"What was that boy asking?" questioned Miyu as they walked away from the stables.

"That boy's name is Butch Walker. He was asking if you would like to come with him to ride on one of the Pegasi. He gets along with Pegasi the best out of all the demigods in camp." replied Chiron as they walked over to a group of cabins in a rectangular formation.

They walked to the center of the cabins in front of a great fire before Chiron stopped walking. There was a small girl tending the fire, but she didn't turn her head, so Miyu decided to ask about her later.

"There are currently 20 cabins to different Greek gods at our camp. We are currently building more, but it is taking a while. I'll show you each cabin separately." He started walking to the largest "cabin" in the area, one that is just left of the next largest cabin.

It looked more like a temple than any cabin Miyu could imagine. It sure seemed auspicious enough. It was constructed completely from marble, and had thick heavy columns on the sides of the door of the cabin. The entrance to the cabin itself was two large bronze doors, polished enough to see one's reflections in. The doors also seemed to have lightning streaking past them every other second or so.

"This is Cabin One, the one where the children of lightning live," said Chiron. "To the right of it, we see Hera's cabin. She is the goddess of marriage, so she won't cheat on her husband, but the Cabin Two here is honorary." Hera's cabin was in the same style as her husband's, however her cabin somehow looks more graceful and well furnished. There are peacocks decorating the cabin, with flowers hanging from the walls.

Chiron led Miyu down the wing of cabins extending from Cabin One. "This here is Cabin Three. The sons of the sea god Poseidon live in this cabin." Cabin Three looked much more humble than the aforementioned One and Two. It was a long, low building with windows facing the ocean. The cabin was made from rough sea stone, pieces of coral and seashell embedded into the outside walls, and a three pronged spear with a large bronze number 3 over the door.

The next cabin down the line was Cabin Five, dedicated to the god of war, Ares. It looked like a badly maintained fort of some kind. There was red paint on the walls of the cabin, but they were incredibly faded and messy. Barbed wire lined the roof of the house, while a large head of some kind of devilish looking pig was hanging from the entrance of the cabin.

Following Cabin Five was Cabin Seven, and it was...made entirely out of gold? Miyu read that all the gold ever mined by mankind would fit into a 20 meter cube. Even just a kilogram of gold was worth several ten thousand dollars. A cubic meter of gold is around 19 tons. Just what was the budget for this camp? When Miyu asked Chiron, he just chuckled, and said it was a secret.

The rest of the cabins went by in a flash. Cabin Nine had a giant statue of a golden dragon lying down on the rooftop. Cabin Eleven just looked like a regular cabin, unlike almost every other cabin in the cabin. Cabin Thirteen was somewhat reminiscent of Cabin One. It was made of solid obsidian, had no windows, and had think columns. Green torches hung from the walls of the cabin. Cabin Fourteen was built from various stones with water pouring down from a pipe on the roof that creates a rainbow effect. Cabin Fifteen looked like a house that you would find in the middle of a prairie, and didn't look like much. Cabin Sixteen looked like a more furnished and updated version of the Cabin Eleven. It had a broken wheel hanging over its door. That was the last cabin in the left win.

Cabin Seventeen had a large statue of some kind of goddess, and there were many medals and certificates hanging from the cabin's walls and door. Cabin Eighteen was built like Cabin Two, but on a much smaller scale, but instead of engravings of peacocks, there were giant eagles of various species hanging around the cabin. Cabin Nineteen so far looks like a regular cabin, but the equipment surrounding it implicates that the decorations have yet to be completed. Cabin Twenty looks normal, but Chiron informed Miyu that it was built from blocks of magical stone. It certainly felt like it. Miyu was able to sense the magical energy pouring out the cabin.

Cabin Twelve had grapevines growing all over it;on the walls, on roof, even on the door. Cabin Ten was a small wooden cabin with a blue painted roof and pillars with gray walls. The cabin following it looked normal, and it had designs of wild animals carved into the wood. Cabin Six was a modern looking gray building. Outside, Miyu could see plain white curtains and an owl design over the door. The last cabin they visited was Cabin Four, Demeter's. It was similar to Cabin Twelve, but instead of grapevines, it was covered in crops of every variety.

By the time the tour was over, it was already time to eat. "Would you like to eat, Miss, Miyu?"

Miyu nodded, she felt hungry. After all, she hasn't eaten since breakfast.

* * *

"*** *******, ****** ******* Miyu Emiya!" said Chiron to the large cheering crowd of demigods sitting down to eat lunch.

Miyu didn't understand what Chiron was saying about her, but if whatever he is saying was garnering such a reaction from the other campers, it couldn't be that bad. She did ask Chiron what that was about after he returned to his wheelchair to eat the food on the table next to where Miyu was sitting.

Miyu noticed that there were actually nineteen tables besides the one where she, Chiron, Mr. D, and a teenager with a mane of red bushy hair were sitting at. Everyone table except for one of them had at least one camper sitting there, waiting for food to be served.

"Chiron, who sits there?" asked Miyu while pointing to the empty table. It was also larger than most of the other tables for some reason.

Chiron looked to where she was pointing. "Oh, that table is reserved for when the Hunters of Artemis stay over."

Miyu tilted her head, "The Hunters of Artemis?"

"There are many different options for a demigod to take, the Camps are just two of them. The Hunters of Artemis are another one, albeit only for young teen girls. Artemis doesn't discriminate by background. As long as you forswear any future relationships, you will be allowed to join. You will find that besides demigods, the Hunters also have mortals and nymphs, as well as others among their number. The most alluring part of joining is that until you break your oath of maidenhood, leave the Hunt, or die in combat, you are given immortality. " Chiron answered.

"Ah." Miyu nodded. They definitely sounded interesting. Immortality would definitely be an alluring. She would be interested herself, but would she really be comfortable living as a 10 year old forever?

"By the way Miyu, if you are going to stay here, you will have to learn English. It wouldn't do for you to only be able to talk to me, would it? Would you like to learn English?"

Miyu nodded, that made sense.

"Excellent, I will have a camper that can speak Japanese start tutoring you in English starting tomorrow, alright?"

After they finished eating lunch, Chiron led Miyu back to the Big House. "Normally, campers stay in the cabins of their godly parents, as this is a camp for demigods after all. The Roman exchange demigods also stay in their godly parent's or ancestor's houses, but they have a different schedule from the rest of their cabin mates. However, you are not a demigod. If it was another mortal, I would've had them stay in the oracle's cave with our oracle, Rachel Elizabeth Dare, but because you don't understand English, that would be inconvenient. In the meantime, you will be staying in a room in the Big House for the time being. Is that ok with you Miyu?

"Yes Chiron. Thank you for letting me stay here." Miyu replied. She was honest in that reply. These strangers were taking care of and offering shelter to her, and Miyu trusted them, for some reason.

Chiron opened the door to the Big House and led Miyu through the house until he came up to a specific room.

It is a long room with six beds laid down one by one throughout the room. Every bed in the room was the same, white sheets on a white bed. There were also boxes on the wall and stools with the universal red cross symbol on them. That was when Miyu realized that it was some kind of place for healing.

"This room is the Infirmary. We take care and heal injured campers and guests here. While you stay here, you can sleep in this room. Is this all right with you Miyu? I know this place might be a little uncomfortable, but it is all we have right now."

Miyu just simply nodded again. The beds looked comfortable, and she wanted to try living in a Western style house.

"Alright then, now you know where everything is, I will leave you to your devices for now. Dinner will be in a few hours, and light's out is at 9:00 pm. If you get caught out after 9:00, I can not guarantee your safety, got it? The cleaning harpies will eat any stragglers after light's out, so don't get caught."

Miyu gulped, that sounded a little morbid for a camp. "Sure," she nervously stuttered at that new information.

"Alright then, I have a class in Archery to instruct." said Chiron as he walked out the door.

* * *

After Chiron left, Miyu chose a bed and laid down on it. She had a really long day, and it really took a lot out of her. After lying down for around 20 minutes, Miyu got back up.

Alone in a big house without any kind of supervision as far as she knew, Miyu decided that she wanted to explore the house. The only house she has ever been in her life was the one she grew up in, which was a Japanese-style mansion complex large enough for the residents to turn into a boarding house. She has never been in another house before, unless you count her imprisonment by the Ainsworths, but Miyu didn't like remembering that experience.

The room immediately down the hall from the infirmary had its door open, so Miyu decided to go in to check it out. When she walked inside, she saw what appeared to be a room for relaxing in. There was a large table in the middle of the room. The table was green, with white borders and a white line going across the middle of the long side of the table. It had a short net across the width of the table. Two...paddles? Two paddles laid on opposite sides of the table. If Miyu could remember correctly, this table was used to play some kind of sport. It had a very weird name if Miyu remembered correctly, Bonbon? No, it wasn't Bonbon, it had a "p" sound. Panpon? PonPon? PingPan? Ping Pong! yes, it was called Ping Pong.

The room had a lot of other stuff in it. There were bookshelves, leather chairs, and another table in the room. Miyu was drawn to the bookshelves. She spent most of her days alone reading for hours on end. The books on the shelves were not all English, but were they certainly not Japanese, so Miyu didn't bother trying to read them.

The next room Miyu found actually had its door locked, so Miyu had no idea what was going on in there, so she decided to skip it. As she continued to explore every corner of the house, she didn't notice that the entire day had passed by.

* * *

"Say, Miyu, what you did this afternoon," asked a curious Chiron.

"I explored the Big House," said a Miyu with a large chunk of meat halfway to her mouth.

"I see", nodded Chiron. "did you have fun today?"

"Yes, I really enjoyed going around camp-" she was interrupted by her own yawn.

"Well, we usually have campfire after dinner, but it looks like you might be too tired to go. How about you tuck in for the night after dinner?

Miyu nodded. she was starting to nod off during dinner. It didn't help that she didn't sleep much the night before either.

Miyu walked back into the Big House and into a bed with the sound of singing of the campers at the campfire. As she closed her eyes, her last thoughts before falling asleep were that this was the first time in a month that she would be able to sleep soundly.

* * *

Somewhere in an urban area of a large city, a single card glowed. Normally, it would've taken weeks, if not months for it to escape the prism world, but thanks to the abundant mana in the air due to this world in the age of the gods, it escaped much sooner than possible. It certainly helped that the soul of this particular card was familiar with the air of this era, otherwise it would've taken much longer to escape. However, it now will take perhaps another week before the card will actually be able to form a body and pursue the object that it seeks.

 **"Holy Grail..."**


	3. Chapter 3

**Writing a nice detailed story is harder than I thought, especially when you want to include actual details and emotions instead of just plain dialogue and events.**

 **To answer some questions, I have no plans for the class cards to go to specific demigods yet, and I'll be sticking to canon on what Heroic spirits are actually in the class cards.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own any part of the Nasuverse or Percy Jackson and the Olympians. They belong to Type-Moon and Rick Riordan respectively.**

 _'thoughts'_

* * *

Light shone out of the infirmary window as dawn broke the horizon. Miyu twitched. She didn't like early mornings, but she got up, stretched, and yawned. It has been a week since Miyu first stepped foot into the camp. Since then, things have pretty much set into routine.

As she wasn't a camper, Miyu generally was allowed to do what she wanted. The first thing she had after breakfast was have English lessons with Alice Miyazawa, a daughter of Hermes. Despite being raised in the States her entire life, Alice was really good at Japanese, and was a good teacher. Miyu liked to think that she was a good student too, but the truth is that this was the first time she was tutored by anyone. Yes, she sometimes had her brother help her out with a few times, he never seeked her out to teach her anything.

Alice said that Miyu was a really quick learner, and that she was really astounded by the speed that Miyu was learning English.

* * *

"You are making me jealous at the pace you are learning English, Miyu." Alice said the day before after their lesson.

"Really?"

"Yeah! If I could learn a new language as fast as you can, I wouldn't be having so many problems with French. You really are a prodigy, Miyu." Alice replied that day.

* * *

Miyu didn't think she was all that great of a student. She was just good at paying attention and not being distracted.

It did not occur to her that her studying skills were skewed from living her entire life doing nothing but reading and cooking everyday.

Ready for the day, Miyu hopped off the infirmary bed and changed into her everyday clothing. It was still quite early in the morning; breakfast doesn't start for another half an hour or so.

She headed out to the front deck of the Big House. There, Mr. D and Chiron were playing their pinochle game. They looked like they were just finishing up.

"Hello Mr. D, hello Chiron, good morning." said Miyu in her still developing English.

Chiron glanced at her. "Your English is improving."

"Thank you Chiron."

"Could use some work on removing that accent though," said a grumpy Mr. D as he shuffled the cards in his hands. "Would you like to join us, Miyu?"

"Yes." Miyu sat down next to the wine god and the centaur in a wheelchair.

"Would you like to play any particular card game, Miyu?"

"Umm..., I don't know a lot of card games, so I'll with anything you guys choose."

"Hmmph. There aren't a lot of card games that can be played effectively with three people." grumbled Mr. D. "Crazy Eights is a good game to start with Mike Elizabeth."

Miyu nodded. She discovered Mr. D's tendency to call everyone's names wrong the third day she was at camp.

* * *

Miyu was staring at the ocean on the beach after lunch.

"Hey, what are you doing out here."

Miyu turned around. Standing maybe 5 meters back, was the older teen that brought her to camp and a girl around his age that was holding his hand.

The girl had long curly blonde hair, and stood tan and tall. She looked like one of those models that were on the magazines in the back of the rec room. However, unlike those pictures, the girl had stormy gray eyes. Miyu recognized her. She was the head councilor of Cabin Cabin Six, and could be seen either with the older teen or drawing in a remote area.

Miyu didn't reply for a while, and instead just turned her head and continued to watch the ocean.

"I heard that you couldn't speak English at first, but now you can almost have conversations. That's amazing." The teen and his female friend decided to sit next to Miyu, but she still ignored them.

"My name is Percy Jackson, and this is my girlfriend Annabeth." At this statement, Miyu did turn her head.

"Isn't your name Peter Johnson?"

...

...

...

The blonde started laughing uncontrollably, and doubled over while hitting the sand with her fists. The boy, whatever his name was, had a frown decorating his face. "It's not funny Annabeth!"

 _His name wasn't Peter Johnson? Oh well, it didn't matter in the end_ , Miyu thought, as she watched the teen boy try to stop his girlfriend from laughing.

"Okay," started Annabeth, after she calmed down. "Did you hear that name from Mr. D?"

Miyu nodded, but performed no other action.

"Well, Mr. D will often call the campers the wrong names on purpose or on accident, so most of the names coming from his mouth shouldn't be taken seriously.

* * *

After a few minutes, Miyu places down the last card in her hand. It was an eight.

"Congratulations Miyu, it looks like you win," said Chiron. He still had two cards in his hand.

"I give up, I will never beat either of you ever, will I?" sighed Mr. D.

Chiron sat up, "Well that was fun, but let's go eat breakfast now."

* * *

"So, do you have any hobbies?"

Miyu looked up from her pancakes and syrup. The red-headed girl sitting across the table from her, Rachel, asked her a question.

Seeing no point in answering it, she went back to her breakfast.

"It is rude to purposely not answer someone's question after you acknowledged that you heard them, Miyu," said Chiron, who was eating a grilled cheese sandwich.

"I dunno, I can understand why Mikayla wouldn't answer that question. Too troublesome," said Mr. D while sipping from a Diet Coke.

All of a sudden Miyu felt guilty. It was rude to not answer, but just when she opened her mouth-

"It's ok, it's fine if you don't want to share any of your hobbies. When you are comfortable about sharing them, you can tell me then, ok?" said Rachel.

Miyu hesitated. How should she respond to that? If she didn't say something, she would feel guilty. On the other hand, Rachel basically gave her a free pass.

"Um... I like Archery and mythology class." Well, her brother did want her to make new friends. This is a good way to make one, right?

"Really? I never really liked Archery. It's so stupidly difficult! I will never understand how people make it look so easy," grumbled Rachel.

Miyu tilted her head. Was it really that hard? "It's not that difficult, Rachel."

Rachel shot a look at Miyu. "You just don't understand. For example, look at Percy Jackson," she gestured to the boy sitting with the cyclops, "he has been trying for years, and the closest to a bulls-eye he ever got was when he hit it in on the target next to the one he was supposed to be aiming for."

Miyu blinked. Surely that was a feat that shouldn't be possible. It looked like Chiron saw the look of disbelief on her face, and spoke up.

"I was there. Everyone actually voted to never have him step foot on the archery range a few months ago."

"What did he do?"

"He accidentally hit a camper, who had to stay in the infirmary for a few days. The camper was standing behind Percy."

At that point, Miyu decided to give up trying to make sense of what was going on, and decided to move on to another subject.

"We went over the Trojan War for the past week."

"How was it?" Rachel asked.

"Did the gods really fight each other for a decade over an apple?"

Rachel burst into laughter. "I heard many descriptions of the Trojan war, but I think this is the first time anyone described it like that."

Chiron sighed. "The war is the result of many different factors, Miyu. The gods are known for messing around with mortals, but they have been taking a less active role in the mortal world for the past years."

Miyu nodded. She didn't like the myth herself. She did feel some relation to Helen, but in a depressing way. Helen was a pretty simple, though beautiful, woman. Her life could be seen as different men stole and gifted her to others, like a possession. At the end of the day, Helen was manipulated by the gods, to do something for a complete stranger she has never met before, that started a decade long war.

It didn't make Miyu feel comfortable at all. What would happen if the gods were to discover what she really is? Would she then be taken by them to fill their own personal agendas?

"Miyu, you should finish your pancakes before they get cold," said Chiron after a pause.

Miyu did just that.

* * *

Miyu met the Roman campers at their makeshift mini-camp at the edge of the forest that morning.

Apparently, after a close demigod war, the two camps made peace after almost two millennia of conflict and suspicion. The two camps now had exchange programs in which campers in both camps can choose to switch to the other, and a part time exchange program that allowed campers from either camps to temporarily experience life in the other.

After long talks and discussions, it was ultimately decided to have the Roman demigods to live in a small, separate mini-camp from the other campers. Apparently, having just one group instead of having the campers divided by godly parents is supposed to reflect how...cohorts?...lived together.

The mini-camp consisted of three main buildings. In the center of the camp, there was another campfire, with a flagpole directly behind it flying the colors of Rome. When Miyu was visiting after breakfast, the girl who was tending the fire at the center of the ring of cabins was tending the one at the Roman camp. However, the girl looked different somehow.

Instead of wearing a basic white tunic, the girl was now wearing a regal purple robe. While before, she wore no accessories, she now wore golden jewelry and decorations in her hair. She somehow also looked more imposing than before, despite being the same age as her. However, instead of having the innocent non-threatening aura from before, she was now cloaked in power, enough that Miyu would think that even all the demigods in the camp wouldn't come anyway close to overcoming her.

As there were currently no demigods around, Miyu decided to swallow down her fear and approach the girl. "Hi?"

The girl turned her head, and it was at that exact moment, that she noticed the girl's eyes. Though the yellow and orange eyes looked warm, they were blazing with power, like a blazing inferno.

"How may I help you?" the terrifyingly powerful girl inquired.

"Umm... I know most of the things around here now, but I haven't seen this camp yet. Will you show me around?"

The girl paused and looked at her. She looked innocent enough, but all the senses in Miyu's body told her to run and flee from the thing sitting in front of her, but for some reason, she just stood there and stared back.

After a minute or two, the girl blinked. "You seem to be honest. Very well, Miyu. My name is Vesta."

Vesta? That was an odd name, but she definitely read about it somewhere. It sounded Roman. A name of deity perhaps? Right, the goddess of the hearth...

Miyu took a look at the girl, and the fire she was just attending, and then back at the girl.

Vesta looked amused. "It looks like you figured out my identitiy."

The goddess stood up. "Well, do you want me to show you around here or not?"

Miyu hastily nodded yes. From what she read in myths and legends, people who displease the gods tend to have really bad fates.

The goddess smiled and led her to a small nearby storage shed.

The shack was small, but looked newly built with a painted red roof. When the goddess opened the door, Miyu couldn't help but gasp.

Gold. The shack was stocked to the brim with golden swords, spears, shields, and armor. Now that she thought about it, the weapons that the Romans used usually looked like they were shinier than the Greeks'. At first Miyu thought it was just that the Romans took better care of their weapons than the Greeks. She was clearly wrong.

"These weapons are made of Imperial Gold. Some call it Enchanted Gold, but we call it the former. Camp Jupiter has recently come across a large stash of Imperial Gold weaponry, so we decided to have a small armory at Camp Half-Blood too," explained Vesta.

 _'It certainly looks impressive'_ thought Miyu. Gold is well known to be a pretty soft metal. For it to be reliable in combat, the enchantments on the gold must have been extensive. It also reminded Miyu of something that she read about in a book about Alchemy. Gold is a reliable and high quality material to use in Alchemy and magecraft. Again, Miyu couldn't begin to imagine how much all these weapons cost.

"You can take one of these for yourself, if you want."

Miyu blinked at the goddess's words. Could she really? She was only here for a week, and here a goddess offering her to take a weapon from the,.

"Really. There are many dangerous monsters and people wandering the world. Everyone should be able to defend themselves," said Vesta upon seeing the hesitation on Miyu's face.

"Alright."

The room offered a wide variety of different weapons. Some looked like they were just recently forged and made, while others look centuries, or even millennia old. There were tradition weapons like the aforementioned swords and spears, but there were also other weapons like axes, knifes, and very peculiarly, a completely golden M-16.

Miyu must've stared at the golden semi-automatic weapon for too long, because Vesta spoke, "While most demigods use traditional weapons, some do throw in some modern designs into the workshop. That was made by one of our blacksmiths after the war here at the forge. I believe that person is working to build a golden AK-47."

Miyu nodded, and kept looking through the pile of weapons, and at the very back of the shed, she found...

"What is this?" Vesta muttered.

It was large longsword. It had an ornate blue hilt with a single large sapphire as its pommel. Instead of being made completely out of gold, it instead had a blade of flawless steel, with gold decorating the fuller of the blade, the cross-guard, and the hilt. On the gold, there were blue decorative designs. The cross-guard, blade, and hilt were connected by an odd looking golden loop.

It was an attractive weapon, but that wasn't what made it stand out. Unlike the other weapons in the room that would explode violently when broken but had no other innate power, this weapon was radiating a presence that Miyu only ever felt a few times before.

 _'It's a Noble Phantasm,'_ thought Miyu. It certainly reminded Miyu of those weapons the installer of the golden king used.

"Crocea Mors," said Vesta after a moment of thinking. "I never thought that it would be here of all places. I certainly heard of an ancient weapon being one of the things found in an ancient Roman workshop on the quest to Rome, but I never thought it would be _that_ weapon. The blacksmiths, both Roman and Greek wanted to melt it down to examine the weapon, but after a month of studying the weapon, everyone gave up because nothing they tried was able to make a scratch on it. But to think it would be this sword..." Vesta muttered.

"Crocea Mors," said Miyu, testing the name. She then switched to Japanese while speaking to the goddess. "What is this weapon? It feels much more powerful than anything else in the room."

Vesta brought her hand up to her hand, as if to relieve herself of a headache. "That is the sword of Julius Caesar. It was deemed lost, but apparently not anymore. It's name means _Yellow Death_ "

The sword Miyu was holding suddenly felt a lot heavier. "Should we have this just lying here? This thing should belong in a museum."

The goddess shrugged. "Weapons were made to be used, not to be put on exhibit. What's the point of a weapon that is never used?"

Miyu looked away from the large golden sword. She had to pick something that would actually work. Most of the weapons in the shed were just flat out too heavy for Miyu to use at all. After another few minutes of searching, Miyu decided upon a _pugio_ , a Roman dagger. The weapon's blade was 9 inches long and was around 2 inches in width with a leaf-like shape. The edge of the weapon was flat. It seemed to suit her. Any other kind of weapon in the shed was too heavy for her anyway.

As the two girls walked out of the shed after Miyu picked her weapon, the Roman campers came back. As they saw Vesta walking around, they instantly halted, and arranged themselves in a line formation.

The campers' leader, a teen named Bobby stepped forward and bowed. "Good morning, Lady Vesta."

"Hello Bobby," replied the goddess, "I was taking Miyu on a tour of this campsite. I already took her to the armory, and she picked up a nice _pugio_. Is there any problems with that?"

"No, my lady," replied the camper.

"Very well, carry on." Just like that, the Roman campers returned to what they were doing, whether it was cleaning weapons, changing, or doing some reading.

"The gods were a somewhat of a bigger deal in Rome than in Greece," explained Vesta. "However, we don't really interact with the Romans all that much. So they will show more respect to us than Greek demigods would. Let's continue the tour."

From there, Vesta showed Miyu the three larger buildings in the camp. Two of them were cabins made for sleeping; one for boys, and one for girls. Unlike the Greeks', the Roman residence was more practical, and had less decorations. The last large building was a small temple. In it, there were alters to each of the individual Olympians, as well as several alters to a few important minor gods.

When they finished the tour and returned to the entrance of the camp, Vesta waved, and said, "That was the first time in a while I enjoyed myself this much. Feel free to come again, if only to talk. My Greek counterpart, Hestia, is the one attending the fire at the Greek wing of cabins. She would like some company too."

Miyu waved back, and smiled, "Sure, Lady Vesta," and took a short bow. "See you later."

* * *

That afternoon, she was at the track field.

The instructors there were several forest nymphs. The ones they were teaching at the moment were Miyu, the Hermes cabin, the Nikes cabin, and the Ares cabin.

While most of the campers at the track expected Miyu to fall behind, she was unexpectedly able to keep up with the Nikes cabin members, despite only being mortal. She didn't beat any of them, but they congratulated her on her attempt, but also bragged that they will always keep ahead of her. Following the Nikes cabin was the Hermes cabin, and some of the faster members of the Ares cabin. It made sense. Most of the Hermes cabin regularly stole or pulled pranks on the other campers. Being able to run away fast enough would be essential.

After track, Miyu decided to go to head over to the Big House to ask Chiron for instruction on how to use her knife in the first place.

"You should go ask Annabeth. She is the most experienced knife user at Camp-Half Blood," said Chiron.

And that's how Miyu found herself walking to the training arena with Annabeth.

"A Knife isn't as large or powerful as a sword, and is best used by clever people, do you understand, Miyu?" said Annabeth while demonstrating how to use a knife.

Miyu nodded. Unlike a demigod, she didn't have innate battle instincts or reflexes, so it took a while for her to understand what Annabeth is saying.

"I recommend learning how to use another weapon in combat too, as in most cases a knife is just a secondary weapon and not very useful in most situations. You are good with a bow and arrow right? You should keep practicing archery in case you ever need to go into combat," explained Annabeth while correcting Miyu's form.

"Alright."

After a few minutes, when Annabeth appeared satisfied with Miyu's technique and stance (which she spent over 15 minutes lecturing to Miyu), she stopped Miyu after one last practice slash. "Now try that on a dummy." The arena had several training dummies around, and there were currently no one using them, as practical hand on hand swordplay was what the other demigods in the arena were doing.

Annabeth brought Miyu to one of the shorter practice dummies. It was a bit shorter than Annabeth, and had traditional Greek armor on it: a Celestial Bronze platemail. One of the practice dummy's arms had a small Celestial Bronze bar attached to it, perhaps as practice for weapon users.

"We also have practice automatons, but they are still in development, and only older demigods really use them. Anyone not experienced will likely be crushed by the machines' enhanced strength. You might be able to use them, since Celestial Bronze just doesn't work on you and all..." Annabeth muttered the last line. Miyu wasn't too eager to fight an automaton though. So far, it seems only Celestial Bronze weapons slice right through her, clothes and all, with no negative effects. However, she could still physically touch Celestial Bronze and Imperial Gold, so she wasn't too optimistic about the chances a Celestial Bronze golem can crush her with its body.

"Now, in an actual fight with a knife, you want to finish the engagement as soon as you can, do you understand, Miyu?" said Annabeth.

"Yes."

"In a fight while wielding a knife, your weapon is merely an extension of your arm. It is imperative to step in deeply and directly. More experienced knife users also employ sidestepping and blocking, but we'll do that later."

 _'That made sense_ ,' thought Miyu. _'No use in teaching her advanced techniques without the basics._ '

"Since you are using a knife, instead of a weapon like a sword, axe, or a spear, you will always be at a disadvantage against others due to range. You must target weak points in a target. The most important of these targets would be their weapon arm. If your opponent is also using a weapon, it is essential to make them unable to use it. To do that, I would recommend to attack their joints, veins, and arteries. Attacking these points will slow down your opponent and wear them down, if not completely cripple their ability to continue."

Miyu couldn't help but wince at Annabeth's words. Her explanations sounded...very violent. Miyu knew from her books on the human body where the points Annabeth were discussing are, but to maim her opponents in such a painful way...

Annabeth caught the look on Miyu's face, and quickly tried to reassure her. "Don't worry, I doubt you will ever have to attack those places specifically. Mythological monsters will most be likely the only threats you will ever have to face, if at all. Monsters are attracted to demigod scent, which you don't have. Most weaker monsters will be killed instantly with a deep enough wound from a Celestial Bronze or Imperial Gold weapon. Only more powerful monsters take more than that to kill them. For example, a Hellhound will typically die from a single slash from a Celestial Bronze weapon or arrow, but a monster like the Minotaur will usually take several deep wounds before being killed."

Something in that explanation didn't make a lot of sense to Miyu. "Um...the Minotaur? Didn't it die several millennia ago, killed by a hero?" asked Miyu.

Annabeth laughed. "Well, the thing is, monsters can be killed, by they don't really die. They don't have souls like you and I. After you slay a monster, they disintegrate and turn to dust. Monsters can stay disintegrated for centuries, or in some cases, millennia if your lucky. After a while, they rise up from Tartarus and get reborn in the mortal world. How fast a monster comes back after being killed varies between monster to monster. The Furies for example, usually come back really quickly after being slayed. The Gigantes on the other hand can only be brought back using unorthodox methods."

Miyu narrowed her eyes. Annaeth's explanation made sense, except the part about souls. If she didn't know any better, that kind reincarnation of sounds like the Third Magic, which essentially allows perfect reincarnation and preventing the rotting of a soul. Without that, a soul would usually be recycled into the Root shortly after death. even in her own world, only one individual was ever able to master it. Sure, there are practitioners of the Third Magic, but no other masters. However, if you don't have a soul, that kind of reincarnation is impossible. After all, the soul is the mind and memories of an individual. If monsters don't have them...

"How is it possible for an intelligent being to not have a soul?"

Annabeth looked at Miyu strangely, as if she was the first one to ever ask that question. "Well, I did say they don't have souls like you and I, right? They might have some kind of souls. There is actually another metal besides Celestial Bronze and Imperial Gold that is deadly against monsters, but this one can still be used by mortals. However, only children of the underworld wield weapons made of that metal, called Stygian Iron. It is some kind of indestructible metal that is mined in the underworld and cooled in the River of Styx. Instead of destroying a monster's physical form and scattering its essence into Tarturus, Stygian Iron weapons actually absorb a monster's essence upon killing them, and destroys it, and the monster effectively dies. What the weapon absorbs might be a 'soul' of a monster."

"Really? So the monsters might just be shedding their souls every time they are killed and take on a new one?" asked Miyu.

Annabeth brought her right hand to her chin, and thought for a second. "It is definitely possible. You know Daedalus?"

Miyu nodded. She read about his myth in a book about Greek Myths from her family's library.

"Well, a few years ago, we discovered that he didn't die millennia ago. He was actually able to use magic to keep transferring his soul onto mechanical bodies for several millennia. He accepted his death though, and his denial of it, and died a few years ago."

"Oh." That actually did sound a lot like Heaven's Feel, being able to keep transferring his soul to various bodies for millennia. Truly, the mysteries beings from the Age of the Gods are capable of are formidable, and any magus would die to learn it.

Annabeth shook her head, and opened her mouth, "We went too much off topic. Let's get back to practicing." And just like that, the two girls went right back to practicing how to fight with knives.

* * *

A week after she started taking knives lessons with Annabeth, Miyu found herself playing pinochle with Chiron, Mr. D, and a strange...man with hairy legs and hooves like a goat.

"Good morning Miyu," said Chiron when Miyu walked into their card game. "I don't think you really interacted with the satyrs yet. This is Grover Underwood, the Leader of the Council of Cloven Elders. It is their job to search for new demigod campers, and to make sure that nature is in balance, which has been especially important since the death of the god Pan."

Out of everything that Chiron just said, only the last detail really caught Miyu's attention. "Gods can die?"

Mr. D, who was the one dealing the cards, angrily turned to Miyu, "No you impudent mortal. The god Pan just decided to take a vacation...forever. No, we gods and monsters don't _die_ die."

"But they can fade," spoke the goat-man reaching out for his cards after Dionysus finished dealing them.

"Fade?" inquired Miyu.

"Gods and monsters will typically live forever without ever dying, but..." trailed off Chiron.

Grover picked up on where Chiron left off. "when people start forgetting a god or monster exists or their domain gradually starts disappearing, they will start withering away, until..."

He didn't finish that thought, and that dark thought seemed to continue lingering on throughout the card game.

Miyu tried to change the subject. "So you are a faun, Grover?"

Grover instantly scowled, "No, faun are Roman. There is a huge difference between satyrs and fauns. We, the satyrs, actually do jobs around, like servicing the gods and taking care of nature, while fauns are just leeches that are totally lazy and don't do anything with their lives," ranted Grover.

"In other words, one of them aren't totally useless, and the other ones are useless trash to society," drawled Mr. D.

"Exactly!" exclaimed Grover.

Nearing the end of the game, Miyu suddenly had another thought. If the gods monsters will fade away if not enough people know their stories or myths, wouldn't that imply that they exists by people knowing their stories and myths? And the Greek gods are exactly that, _Greek_ , so wouldn't that mean...

"Are there other gods out there, Chiron?"

Chiron raised one of his bushy eyebrows, "What do you mean by that, Miyu?"

"Like gods from other religions, deities like Thor or Buddha, or the Hebrew God for example."

After Miyu spoke the last word in that sentence, no one at the table spoke for a minute. After two minutes, Miyu started to worry that she just said something horribly offensive or foolish, with an actual Greek deity in the flesh sitting next to her.

"I haven't had anyone ask me that question in a long time," finally spoke Chiron. He sighed, "looks like I win again."

Chiron turns to make a sharp look at Mr. D, who only shrugs in response. Chiron took a deep breath, "We usually don't ever talk about other gods, and each religion tends to avoid contact with each other. Anyway, why did you suspect that there are perhaps other gods out there besides us, Miyu?"

"Well, Grover said that monsters and gods can fade from either deterioration of their domains, or being forgotten by mortals. That implies that said monsters and gods need humans to remember them in order to stay immortal."

"Well spotted. There are indeed other gods in the world. Some of them have come in contact with Greek and Roman gods before back when their civilizations clashed with each other, others we have relatively little contact with, if at all." Chiron looked at Mr. D again. "Would you like to elaborate further, Mr. D?"

The god looked up, and grumpily said, "Yeah, the other _gods_ ," he poke with distaste. "Some of them are respectable, but others like absolute savages. Well, interacting with other deities from other pantheons can result in losing influence over our domains, since contact with other gods would be the similar to acknowledging that we aren't the only gods in the world. Because of that, different pantheons of gods rarely if ever interact contact with each other. Rather than directly intervening against one another, we usually send mortals or heroes as our instruments to defeat other civilizations, and if the local deities haven't really established themselves yet, eradicate their religion."

Mr. D took a large gulp from his Diet Coke before continuing, "Us Greeks and Romans were particularly good at other religions, before our _lord and savior_ ," Mr. D said those words with heavy sarcasm, " _Jesus Christ_ decided to establish his religion as the primary religion in Western civilization. We are still around of course. Just because we are no longer worshiped by the religion we belonged to doesn't mean that we would fade away just like that. Any civilization that is still remembered today or has made enough contributions that survived to the modern age has a religion that is still alive."

Miyu had a minute to let those words sink into her. 'So virtually every religion exists in some shape or form, but require influence in the modern world to sustain themselves.'

Grover laughed nervously, "A monster can comeback after fading away."

Miyu looked at Grover. "How? I thought that fading away to a god or monster would be similar to oblivion."

Grover winced at that. "Yeah, but over the last few years, the Titans and Gigantes made a comeback. While that was going on, more and more powerful monsters started reappearing. Stheno and Euryale, the sisters of Medusa, supposedly faded away millennia ago, but were sighted just half a year ago.

"Really? Does that mean that gods can also come back from being faded?" inquired Miyu.

"Percy and Annabeth believe they can. The Titan Iapetus and the Gigantes Damasen fought against the primordial deity Tartarus in order to buy them time to escape. Percy and Annabeth promised to spread their stories to one day bring them back."

Chiron returned to his centaur form, leaving his wheelchair next to the playing card table. "I think that's enough discussion for now. I think it's time everybody went to sleep. Miyu, I want to talk to you before we hit the sack, ok?"

Grover rose from his chair, and walked off into the forest, where Miyu assumed where he lived. Mr. D simply burst into a flash of light, to presumably retire to Olympus for the night.

Chiron walked Miyu to the infirmary. "The Winter holidays are ending soon," he spoke in Japanese.

Miyu looked up at Chiron, "so?"

"Most campers are summer only, very few actually stay year-round, and that is usually because their demigod scent attract too many monsters for them to live in the mortal world for very long before they are in danger. One of the few exceptions where demigods can live more or less safer than other places are cities like New York, where the presence of the gods reduce the number of monsters roaming around. Now, since you are actually mortal, there shouldn't be any issues with you living in the mortal world for most of the year. Besides, school starts soon, and we can't have you missing your formal education, right?"

Miyu was estatic. 'I'm going to school!' It was one of the things that her brother promised that she would do after he starts taking her outside. Sure, Miyu enjoyed life at Camp Half-Blood, but felt a bit trapped at times. She wanted to see the city in which she traveled to get to the camp, and to make new friends.

"Where am I going to start? Which school am I going to?"

Chiron chuckled, "Well, we can't have you wandering around in the mortal world by yourself, so I decided to ask demigod parents if they would like to let you stay at their house."

"Did anyone of them say yes?" asked an excited Miyu.

Chiron smiled, "the first parent I ask said that she would love to host you for the school year."

"Who is it, where does she live?"

"Her name is Sally Jackson."

"Sally...Jackson." Miyu spoke, "she's Percy Jackson's mother, right?"

"Yes she is, and the person who brought you here."

"Why would she let me stay with her? We are virtually complete strangers, even if we knew each other for a few hours."

Chiron smirked at Miyu, "she said that she knew that you were a nice girl...and something about that she always wanted a daughter."

Miyu didn't know how to react to the last part of the statement, but decided to shrug it off. "Alright..."

"You should start packing your possessions over the next few days before the vacation ends, so you can start selecting middle schools you can go to. You are eleven, right?"

"Yeah, I'll start packing tomorrow..." she was interrupted by a heavy yawn. "Sorry 'bout that."

Chiron chuckled, "I think it's time for you to go to sleep now, Miyu.

* * *

Medea wasn't sure why she is so close to the last place that she should be.

When the Gigantes rose up again to start the Second Gigantomachy, she took Gaea's offer to manage the spirits immediately. She knew that if Gaea won, it wouldn't be too long until the Earth Mother would turn on her, but Medea didn't care, as long as she had the chance to finally get her envisioned revenge against Hera and Aphrodite, even if that meant leaving Elysium and being sentenced to the Fields of Punishment or worse, the pit after failure.

The gods ruined her life, making her fall in love with a complete stranger, only to have said stranger betray her and abandon her for a princess of another city even after years of marriage, six children, and giving everything she had to him. Two of her sons, Mermeros and Pheres were killed by the Corinthians in which she lived among for a decade. Tisander and Aclimenes both died in unfortunate accidents shortly afterwards. Only Thessalus and Eriopis survived.

Since then, she wandered from land to land, city to city, only to be driven out each time.

She traveled to Thebes, where she healed her friend, the former Argonaut Heracles from Hera's induced madness. At Thebes, Medea had something to confide her troubles with, and somebody to share her hatred with Hera. However, despite Heracles help, she was soon also driven out of Thebes.

After years of travel, she finally made her way to Athens. There, she met and married the King, Aegeus. They had a son together named Medus, and Medea thought her life was finally turning up again.

But no, another one of those Olympus damned heroes had to come and ruin her again. Despite what Theseus and his "father" Aegeus claim, they were not father and son. The second Medea laid her eyes on the damned boy, she knew instantly that Aegeus' beloved son wasn't his, but the spawn of the god Poseidon. She tried to tell Aegeus, but he was not having any of that, and gave Medus' inheritance to a boy who wasn't his son in any way.

That idiot Theseus squandered the throne almost immediately after he received it too, on what? Abducting woman. Truly, heroes were the worst kind of people.

After leaving Athens, she and her son kept bumping around from city-state to city-state, until she finally returned to Colchis, where she died.

Ever since Gaea was defeated, Medea went into hiding. She ultimately decided to stay at her aunt Circe's island, a place where female demigods and mortals came to learn the ways of magic. There, Medea helped teach her aunt's students in the ways of magic.

Medea didn't understand why Thanatos or another one of the deities of the underworld hasn't come to collect her, but since they haven't collected her yet, it seemed that she either wasn't on their list of priorities, or that they gave her a free pass.

That's why Medea was unsure why she was taking such a big risk being so close to Olympus, the home of the gods on the eleventh hour of the last day of the year. Mortals everywhere were celebrating the coming of a New Year, and traffic was as heavy as ever, but Medea cared for none of that.

It started roughly a week ago. She and Circe detected a massive spike in Mana in Manhattan. Since Manhattan was naturally the home of the gods, she and Circe wrote it of to the gods arguing again. A few days later, another spike of magical energy appeared, this time in Brooklyn.

Medea would'be paid no attention to it, until she looked at the cause of the spike of energy through one of the island's many crystal balls.

It was a small card on the rooftop of a store, in which Medea knew as Lowe's Home Improvement. By itself, the card would've been completely insignificant.

But it wasn't just a card. It was so far from just a card. Around it, she could see the Mist swarming around it, making some kind of half formed body made of the Mist. Though Medea could barely see it, she could make out a hourglass figure of a woman, and a long cloak that concealed its features. Ancient Greek symbols hovered around the air, orbiting the card in the center of the figure. The sight felt both disturbing, and somehow familiar to Medea.

After seeing that, telling her aunt that she will be out to investigate something that caught her attention.

And now, Medea is standing on the roof of the store the card is on, and in front of the Mist figure surrounding the card.

Now, Medea could make out the card's features more clearly, and it unnerved her. Medea has seen many things over her lifetime. She witnessed both Gigantomachies, the greatest hero of Ancient Greece being laid low by the gods, and witnessing the same curse of love the gods gave her inflicted onto other men and women. However, none of them compared to what she saw now.

The figure surrounding the card was not just any special figure, it was _her_. Sure, the figure appears younger than she was, and had different color hair, but Medea knew for sure that it was her. The surrounding Ancient Greek characters and the sound of spoken words, _words_ that she knew for sure that virtually no mortal in this time could still speak, only convinced her further that the _thing_ in front of her was herself.

Seeing that the _thing_ made no hostile actions, and only stood still the entire time that Medea arrived in her chariot, observed, and studied it was equally unnerving.

Medea used a few spells which were supposed to identify what stood in front of her, but so far she only received information that she already knew about.

"What are you?" she spoke to the her in front of herself, but as always, the figure didn't respond, instead just chanting words whose purpose were to collect magical energy.

"If you won't reveal what you are, I suppose I will just have to blast that information out of you," spoke the witch, and just like that, she turned around and boarded her chariot.

Medea ordered her dragons, "Up, now!" and circled the figure that still stood ever still on the rooftop of the building that Medea just left."

 _ **"Macha Εκάτη Grae"**_

As soon as Medea finished the last syllable to the Divine Words, countless purple spheres each surrounded by three magical circles appeared in the air behind her and each fired a beam of magic. Each one of those beams were capable of destroying buildings, and she was firing volley upon volley upon the fake _her_ standing on the rooftop of the building.

Medea threw volley after volley of spells at the fake for around half a minute. When she stopped, where a Lowe's Home Improvement store once stood was now ruins riddled with countless small craters. Nearby cars were tossed into the air from the explosions and landed in various positions, creating traffic jams. Sirens were beginning to sound, and Medea noticed bright flashing red and blue lights, but she ignored them all.

She let her dragons down near the center of the crater. Virtually all traces of _her_ was gone, except for the several wisps of Mana in the air. In the center of all the destruction was a single tarot card.

Medea walked over to it and picked it.

"Caster?" she read confusedly. Before she could make any sense of it, the card suddenly started glowing.

Instantly, Medea felt that something was wrong. Something was inside her. Trying to control her. It made no sense. She was the utmost pinnacle of magic users. She should be capable of breaking through any compulsion that isn't directly enforced by the gods themselves.

Despite all logic, the soul belonging to Medea of Colchis took a backseat in her own body, as her appearance changed. The dark yet casual winter clothing turned into a black and purple cloak, complete with a hood, golden linings, and a large piece of jewelry holding her cloak together. She now wore an expensive regal purple dress, and had braided light indigo colored hair, instead of her previously long dark hair. The soul of Class Card Caster now had a body in which it can achieve its goal that even it cannot comprehend.

 **"Holy Grail..."**

* * *

 **Writing this chapter took longer than I expected. I hoped to get this out last week, but I had no inspiration on what to write. Now to answer some questions I know will inevitably crop up.**

 **Yes, I know that Medea apparently murdered her own children according to Piper, but Medea herself claimed that they were murdered by Corinthians. Medea killing her own children actually came up in later versions of the myth. The myth predating that usually have her children killed by Corinthians or in an accident. I went with both.**

 **Now for Medea destroying an entire building very quickly. Remember, in the Riordanverse, we see magic users do some pretty amazing things. Paesiphae for example, the sister of Circe, was able to rebuild the Labyrinth in a cinch. Daedalus, a character that is rarely if ever brought up in fanfics, was essentially able to achieve Heaven's Feels, a true magic of the highest order in the Nasuverse, by switching his soul around to various mechanical bodies. It was never said if his soul deteriorated, but I would assume no because he doesn't look like something similar to Zouken Matou.**

 **Now, Servant Caster (Medea) would've been able to destroy the building at a much faster rate, maybe a few seconds, but I chose around half a minute just to give a sense of how powerful Medea is (at least how powerful I envision her to be in this universe), and to not destroy balance. The headcanon I'm using here on why Medea didn't just obliterate the quest in "The Lost Hero" would be that she was more concerned over escaping the building, since apparently all those ruined potions melted down an entire department store.**

 **Believe me, so far I'm having all fights against class cards with the main characters along surviving by the tips of their hairs. It's difficult since even though the pinnacles of demigods might be able to fight a small monster army by themselves in some cases, even they would have a very hard time to beat someone with 20 times human parameters, which is D-ranked, the average parameters of a Class Card.**


	4. Chapter 4

**Disclaimer: I don't own any part of the Nasuverse or any part of Rick Riordan's works. Nasuverse belongs to Type-Moon, and Rick Riordan's works belong to...well Rick Riordan.**

* * *

Carter was just your average sixteen year old African-American teenager. If you consider "average" as only ever attending four years of formal education, traveling the world for most of his life, learning magic existed approximately two years ago, became the host of a god, moved to a mansion in Brooklyn, became one with a god for a brief period of time (also known as being the "Eye" of said god), brought back a way of magic that has been forbidden for millennia, battled Egyptian gods and demons for the fate of Creation, and then proceeded to destroy the Apophis, the literal embodiment of Evil and Chaos, thus saving the world, and then becoming the literal king of the world of Egypt.

For the past six months, Carter has been busy. He has been with quashing rebellions against the House of Life by other Nomes that still disagree with the Path of the Gods or just didn't like the Kanes in general. And then he learned that not only Egyptian gods are real, but the Greek and Roman ones are real too, which gave him a headache because just when the world was starting to make sense for the Egyptian gods to exist, he finds out other gods exist, and then he remembers watching an image of Moses, a prophet of God, defeat the entire House of Life in the Hall of Ages. The implications of that were mind-blowing. In addition to that, the number of initiates for the House of Life has been booming ever since the defeat of Apophis, so he was pressed for free time whenever he wasn't teaching the newest generation the way of magic and the Path of the Gods or doing Pharaoh stuff.

In other words, he's being stressed out for the past six months.

Carter wanted a peaceful New Year's.

He never saw the big point in celebrating when the clock turns from 11:59 to 12:00 on a certain day of the year. It was after all, just a new year right? What was worth celebrating?

It certainly didn't help that Sadie, his sister, wanted two entire weeks off for Christmas and New Years. Carter wanted to keep teaching the new initiates, since most of them are still have frequent accidents with their magic and are in no way proficient enough. Needless to say the 21st Nome sided with Sadie on that one. Carter was supposed to be the Pharaoh of the House of Life, the person with the position of highest authority in the universe, but he was vetoed by a group of teenagers, some of whom only started learning magic a few weeks earlier.

So he tried to spend his New Year's evening in the mansion's library, studying new scripture about Cleopatra's hosting of Isis that Sadie and Walt (or was it Anubis? Walt was destined to die early in life, and constantly hosting Anubis allowed him to live his life longer. Anubis possessing Walt allowed him to come in contact with Sadie. Who both of them were interested in, and both of whom Sadie liked. Just thinking about it made Carter's head hurt, he usually just went with "Walt") "liberated" from The Met. Yes, "liberated". Pharaohs don't steal. Besides, it's not like they would notice that it was missing. Magical fakes were amazing.

Anyway, Sadie was originally enthusiastic about studying the scripture, but she got bored within a few minutes, and left with Walt for the revelry going on in the living room and backyard.

Carter personally found the ancient artifact fascinating, and couldn't understand why a magician following the Path of Isis and became the Eye of Isis for a short period of time wouldn't show more interest in the script. Honestly, what was he expecting...

Then again, said follower of the Path of Isis was his sister, a rebellious teenager who preferred screaming "Ha-di", the spell of destruction, at anything that bothered her.

Again, Carter wonders just what does Walt-Anubis sees in his sister. Carter had to deal with her for years, and he can't even stand in the same room with her for an hour without one of them arguing or storming out of the room. Outside of life and death situations of course.

So while a wild party was going on upstairs, Carter was in the library studying and hoping that the house wasn't too damaged in the morning.

Oh, who was he kidding, it was practically guaranteed that at least one of the walls of the mansion would be knocked down before he went to bed.

Hormonal teenagers with a repertoire of destructive magical spells in a wild party usually ends up with "accidents". He could feel the distortions in the Duat from the spells being cast even while studying.

On a completely unrelated side-note, most of these incidents had Sadie or Carter involved somehow.

So when one of the newer initiates, a dark haired twelve year-old from Israel named Emily Fabian came up to him and told him that there was something going on, Carter wasn't surprised.

Emily doesn't possess the Blood of the Pharaohs, unlike the other initiates and trainees that live at Brooklyn House. She doesn't even possess Egyptian blood, but rather unlocked the power of magic through an artifact that she found in a basement of the ruins of a church she was hiding out in, quite similarly to Jean-Francois Champollion. According to reports, she was found by the 4th Nome, aka Jerusalem, in a crater where the church used to stand a few weeks ago. Since then, she was taken in by Sadie, and lived at the 21st Nome. She was currently one of the initiates that was in charge of contacting the other Nomes through the scrying bowls of oil on the 4th floor of the mansion.

But when Emily led Carter out of the library, up a flight of stairs and completely ignoring the party raging outside and in the living room, Carter was thrown off. He assumed that whatever problem that is going on would be caused by rumbustious teenagers.

When they arrived at the 4th, Carter noticed that Sadie, Walt, and Jaz were already there, along with two other young initiates.

"What's going on?" asked Carter when he reached the group.

Sadie frowned, "we were just going to ask before you guys decided to finally join us."

She spoke with a slight British accent, but it was faded. Sadie lived in London for most of her life, and only left around two years ago. Since then, she has been losing her accent.

Emily coughed, probably to squash any arguments before any begun, "Well, a few minutes ago, the other initiates and I felt a large disturbance in the Duat coming from the city a few minutes ago. When we located it, we found..."

Emily waved her right hand over a large bowl of oil approximately a meter across. In it, the shiny liquid rippled, until the magicians could see an image of a bird's eye view of a large department store in Brooklyn, one that sold furniture, Carter noted.

Suddenly, a vast number of spherical lights appeared on the surface of the oil, off to the side of the large department store. And in the shadows of the lights, he saw...

"Is that..." Sadie squinted her eyes, "a person in a chariot?"

As if to answer her question, the lights in the sky suddenly erupted with countless purple magical spheres, hiding the figure in the sky behind the glare. Beams of magic poured out of each individual magical sphere...and hit the Department store. It didn't just stop at one blast. The beams of light from the sky repeatedly hit their targets, almost like carpet bombing from a bomber.

Carter wasn't sure how long the barrage lasted, but by the end of it, the Department store was completely gone. In its place, was a ruined patch of land riddled with smothering craters. The recording ended a few seconds after the end of the bombardment.

"Well..." started Jaz, breaking the silence, "that happened."

"When did this occur?" asked Sadie, wide-eyed. "That was some serious magic. I think even I will be hard pressed to do that without assistance from Isis."

"We came to find you as soon as we saw this," said Emily.

"Wait, doesn't that mean that there is a building out there right now in the city that just got destroyed?" asked Walt. He rushed to one of the many windows on the 4th floor that overlooks the city. "Guys... you might want to look at this."

The other magicians in the room followed Walt to the window.

They weren't able to see the area where the building was destroyed.

However, all Egyptian magicians had the ability to see into the Duat, an additional layer(s) of reality that is the spirit world of gods and magic. The Duat was able to do many things, and enables a magician do many things.

Looking into the Duat was one of them. It allowed a magician to see traces of supernatural activity. When the Magicians looked into the Duat...

"Well, it was definitely caused by magic," said Carter. He wasn't about to get a clear sight of what it was, but where the store was several miles away, there was now a mass of magic energy. There were also three more prominent auras, one especially bright one in the center of what happened, and two lesser ones side by side close to where the first one was.

"Well, thank you, Captain Obvious, I definitely couldn't figure that out from the recording before." Sadie remarked. She turned to Walt. "Let's go get our equipment. Carter, get Freak ready."

"Wait, what are you saying Sadie?"

Sadie rolled her eyes, "Well, I _kinda_ want to see what is going on in this city. What else would we be doing? We're checking this out!"

* * *

Freak was a griffin that Carter found in a museum that he was (*cough cough) _borrowing_ from. Since Carter was a host of Horus, and griffins were the sacred animals to the god Horus, Freak was loyal and attached to Carter. Since the incident with the museum, Freak refused to leave. Since then, Freak has been Carter's go to taxi whenever the portals are down, or whenever he has a date with Zia.

With portals being back on line after the eradication of Apophis, Freak has mostly been used for the latter. However, during the Demon Days, the last five days of the calendar, all normal magicians are unable to open portals.

Except Sadie. She has the ability to create magical portals at virtually anytime, regardless of whatever rules said that she couldn't. Of course.

However, to summon a portal, one needed an Egyptian artifact and then chant a specific spell during an important event, which ranges from the birth of gods, different lunar and solar events, and important battles. Carter has painstakingly memorized the most important ones. Sadie on the other hand, and most of the 21st Nome, chose to just chant until they hit an important event by chance. Since there is over 5 millennia of recorded history, they almost always conjure a portal in a few minutes to half an hour. They didn't have the time to wait for Sadie to pull of a portal though, so they took plan B, the boat.

Anyway, the four magicians that went to investigate the magical anomaly riding on a boat pulled by Freak the griffin. The boat was a long story. It was quite a comfortable ride, now that it was outfitted with a dozen spells designed to not have the boat rock around uncontrollably during flight.

When they got close however...

"Look out!" yelled Sadie.

Carter grabbed the reins of the boat and jerked Freak to the fight with a loud squawk. Bolts of lightning arced over their left where they would've been.

When Carter looked up, he saw two golden dragons flying towards them. They were blazing with light, like the boat of Ra, albeit at a lesser degree. And they were pulling a fancy chariot with a woman wearing a cloak over her face.

What stuck out about the woman wasn't her physical appearance, but the _words_. Glowing Words of Power surrounded her figure. Usually, the language of Creation would spontaneously appear and surround magicians of great power. Iskandar, the the longest serving Chief Lector, or head of the House of Life, was powerful enough that the words would just appear around him, even two millennia past his prime and before his death bed. Michel Desjardins, the last Chief Lector, also had Heiroglyphs floating around him, but at a lesser degree than his predecessor. The current Chief Lector, Amos Kane, had them too, but nowhere near as prominent as Desjardins or Iskandar. Sadie herself, the first magician in millennia to cast the spell "Ma'at" only had Words of Power surround her when she became the Eye of Isis. If the magician in front of them had them, it means that she was an incredibly formidable opponent.

However, what was alarming about the Words was that they weren't _Egyptian_. Rather, it was Greek, one of the languages that Carter recognized through his studies in the Rosetta Stone. But why Greek?

"Hey Sadie!" yelled Carter.

"What?"

"I thought that the Greeks don't use magic," screamed Carter as he dodged another bolt of lightning.

"They don't!"

"What Greeks?" inquired Jaz. Unlike the rest of the magicians in the boat, she had no knowledge of the other Gods

"Nothing, we'll tell you about it later, " Carter bit back a curse, and yelled, "Sa-per!" at an incoming lightning bolt.

The symbol for "Miss" appeared in a brilliant blue before Carter, and the bolt of magical lightning missed the magicians by less than a meter to the left. "Any ideas guys?"

Walt lifted himself up after falling to the floor of the boat after the last attack. "Anubis isn't telling me everything, but I can definitely tell you that soul shouldn't still be in this world. Also, she has traces of Divinity, more than your average godling or...similar mortals" he said. He carefully avoided the word 'demigods'.

"Wait, so we're going up against a go-WHAT IN THE BLOODY HELL IS THAT?!" screamed Sadie.

"That" was the mass of purple of spheres surrounded by magical circles that suddenly appeared behind the woman on the chariot. There were several dozen of them, and they were beginning to glow more intensely as the seconds flew by. They were the same spheres that destroyed the department store.

Jaz reached into the Duat and grabbed her staff and wand, "Drowah!"

A wall of light appeared in front of Freak and the magicians, shielding them from the beams of light they instinctively knew would follow.

Or it was supposed to.

The beams of light shattered the shield like it was made of wet tissue paper, and hit the boat and Freak.

The boat had defensive enchantments, a feature necessary back during the war with Apophis, so it weathered the blasts, albeit very battered.

Freak wasn't so lucky. Carter watched Freak being engulfed by a blast of magic. "Freak!"

When the light cleared up, Freak wasn't there. There was nothing in front of the boat at all， just motes of golden sand that peppered the magicians' faces

Carter felt a spike of rage. Sure, Freak the griffin was at first an annoying nuisance. Yes, he was actually hoping Freak was going to leave one day by himself, but over the past months Carter saw Freak as a friend and companion. For a friend a his to be killed like that as if he never existed...

He is going to kill that woman. Ok, maybe not kill, but certainly make her life harsher. But first...

"Everyone, hold on!" yelled Jaz.

With Freak gone, the bow of the boat started drooping and the began plummeting to the street below them.

Sadie pulled out a foot long rod of ivory from her bag, and threw it into the air. The rod glowed, and elongated into a staff, and then morphed into a giant kite the size of a small aircraft. Kite as in the bird of prey, not the toy you play in high wind. It would be ridiculous if it was the latter.

"Get us off this boat!" yelled Sadie.

The kite swooped down into the boat, grabbed the four magicians in its claws, and with its great wings, took to the sky.

The boat crashed into the top of a building a second later, and flipped onto the streets. It crashed into a car, a very expensive looking Lamborghini.

"Well," says Walt, "I don't envy the person who owns that car. Imagine putting getting crushed by a boat on your insurance claim?"

Carter sighs, "Is this really the time?" He turns his head. Sadie was in the other talon of the bird that was holding them up. "Tell this thing to let us on the ground, before that lady stars shooting lasers again."

"Hey, let us down over there," says Sadie, while pointing at a nearby parking lot. It was empty, and was across the street from the destroyed department store. The blaring police cars from the nearby disaster oddly were nowhere near the parking lot.

Out of the corner of his eye, Carter saw the woman in the dragon-drawn chariot swinging by them for another pass. "Get us down there before that lady blasts us to bits!"

The kite complied, and folded its wings in a power dive towards the parking lot, before extending its wings at the last possible moment splattering onto the pavement. It hovered above the pavement, before unceremoniously dropping all four magicians onto the ground.

Carter pulls out his Pharaoh's Crook and Flail. They were like a magician's staff and wand, except tens, no, perhaps a hundred times stronger than a staff and a wand. Carter would usually only use them against especially tough demons, gods, and a rogue Eye of Amun leading an insurrection against the House of Life, but he decided to make an exception this time. "I'll deal with the crazy lady for now, you guys focus on defenses."

The three other magicians instantly got to their feet and started preparing a simple, but effective, protective field. Sadie and Jaz pulled out chalk from their bags that they brought with them. Walt pulled out four elegantly made golden statues covered with protective heiroglyphics directly from his storage place in the Duat.

Walt placed the statues facing the four cardinal directions, while Sadie and Jaz connected them with a large circle drawn out of chalk. In only three seconds, the three magicians had a basic protective field ready in only a few seconds, and were adding extra circles and hieroglyphics for more protection, like "burnproof," "resistant against magic," "Reinforce," and with a touch of brilliance by Jaz, "Hide".

When Jaz finished drawing the last symbol, Carter slammed both of the weapons in his hands into the chalk circle that was about 8 feet in diameter. The magical circles and all the hieroglyphics inscribed in it lit up in a brilliant blue, which signifies it was working.

The woman riding the chariot was approximately a hundred meters away when the magicians finished the protective field, and seemed confused by the lack of enemies. She started circling the area, but never strayed too far away from the location of the four magicians.

"Ok, we need a battle plan against that thing, got any ideas guys?" Carter said to the other magicians.

"Sadie and I finished crafting a working Ribbons of Hathor last week. That woman up there has Divinity, and uses Divine Magic, regardless whether it is Egyptian or not. The ribbons still need some adjustments, but they should work," said Walt.

"I have some potions that would allow us to channel more magical energy than we normally should for around fifteen minutes. However, it will be dangerous to keep casting magic for longer than that. I also have a few explosive vials. The rest of my potions are healing potions," said Jaz. "I'll give you guys the potions now." She handed each magician three different vials, one for each kind of potion Jaz was carrying.

"Isis says that she and Horus are willing to lend us some help in this predicament," spoke Sadie.

"Alright then," Carter said, "Sadie and I will attack her head on. We get rid of those dragons first, and then weaken her so Walt can use the Ribbons of Hathor on her, OK?"

The other magicians nodded, and pulled out their respective equipment.

"Wait a minute," started Jaz, "Do you have the feeling that she can see us?"

The magicians all looked up to the chariot circling the parking lot. Sure enough, the woman was closer than ever before. Now, Carter can make out a regal looking black and purple cloak. He couldn't make out the woman's face, but her head never stopped facing their direction, as if she knew that they were there. The woman then raised a hand in their direction.

"Move it guys!" yelled Carter, and just like that, the magicians scattered as the woman spoke.

"Sa-hei," spoke the witch, words that cannot possibly be Egyptian, but _were_.

The protective field set up by the magicians, now invisible to everyone now that there was no one inside it flickered into eye's view, with the magical energy holding it together swirling, attempting to hold itself together. A second later, the magic that held the protective barrier together literally just fell apart. A protective field capable of holding against gods and army of monsters fell with one word. For a moment, no magician moved as the implications of what they just heard and the feat of bringing down such a powerful protective field like it was nothing at all bombarded their mind.

' _Did she just speak Egyptian? No, she_ clearly _has Greek symbols surrounding her, and no Hieroglyph appeared. But why speak Egyptian? Is she using a translation spell? How did she find and break down the field so quickly? Just who is this monster of a magician?_ ' thought Carter.

Sadie and Jaz were in similar states of shock. They have used much simpler, but similar, protective fields against many deities that held them off for several hits. This mage brought a protective field capable of holding against teams of powerful magicians for long periods of time, furthered powered by the Pharaoh's Crook and Flail, down with one word.

Walt, standing some distance away was more composed than the rest of his team. For a second, the brown eyes of Walt disappeared, replaced by the black eyes of the god of death, Anubis, before returning back to Walt's original brown.

Carter snapped out of his reverie and shouted, "Guys, attack it!" to the rest of the group.

The other magicians instantly took protective stances against the mysterious magician in front of them.

Carter summoned his combat avatar, a twenty-foot tall blue falcon warrior wielding the weapons of the Pharaoh, and leaped up into the air at the woman riding the chariot. More specifically, Carter was aiming at the two large dragons pulling the chariot.

If Freak has to die, then the enemy's mount should go with him.

His aim was true, and Carter's combat avatar shredded through both dragons, instantly turning them into dust. He fell back to the ground, cracking the pavement with his combat avatar's feet.

The chariot now with nothing pulling it, started to fall back towards to Earth, just like the boat the magicians riding.

However, the woman didn't go down with it. She jumped out of the chariot, spread her cloak, and _hovered_ 30 meters above the magicians. She then summoned several dozen purple spheres of light with orbiting magical circles in the air like a cloud behind her and began charging them.

"...Right, that is unfair on so many levels I don't even know where to begin," said Sadie.

The woman, no the witch, thought Carter, began raining down spells. It wasn't like any of the duels between magicians and gods that Carter witnessed and fought in before. There were no summoning of animals, no Divine Words spoken, no complex spell-work with equally complicated defenses. It wasn't even anywhere similar to when Apophis was hurling everything at his disposal at Desjardins to prevent him from being banished.

The best way Carter was able to describe it was that it was literally raining bombs. Each of the purple spheres of light rattled off beams of light nonparallel with each of the others like machine guns. Each beam of light created a large crater in its wake, and blew up debris and dust everywhere. Every blast gave off a sound not unlike the sound of a grenade exploding at close range, deafening any attempt at communication. And it just _wouldn't_ stop. This wasn't a duel of magic between magicians. It was a one-sided bombardment by the enemy. There was literally nothing Carter can do but defend and hope for the best.

Carter brought up his Crook and Flail in a X formation across his chest for defense, and his combat avatar mirrored that action. A protective barrier of light encircled his combat avatar, but even the defense of the Pharaoh's arms were ever so slowly deteriorating from the constant blasts of magic.

Carter didn't know how Jaz, Walt, and Sadie were doing, but they hopefully, _hopefully_ , were fine. Walt was the Eye of Anubis, so he should be fine. Sadie and Jaz ran away in the same direction, so Sadie and Jaz might've pulled something together that could protect them.

After a minute or so, the bombardment stopped. It stopped so abruptly, Carter was startled. When he looked up, he saw the cause of the halt in bombardment.

A large golden combat avatar hung on to the edges of a glass like shield protecting the woman. The combat avatar glowed with the power of the sun, and had somehow an aura of both brutal viciousness and respectful nobility. A golden disk, representing the sun, floated above the combat avatar's head. Instead of the staff and wand of a normal magician, the combat avatar wielded golden bladed claws, similar to Bast's, the cat goddess and the current Eye of Ra, but unlike Bast's were larger, brighter in color, and wielded them on her feet as well as her hands. A lion head sat upon the shoulders of the being, instead of a regular human head, it was a lioness', with flaming hair arranged like a lion's mane. Glowing blood red eyes on the lion's head glared at the avatar's prey with malevolence. Unlike Carter's falcon warrior, which went without clothing from the waist up, the lioness avatar wore blazing red armor that looked like magma erupting from a volcano. And in the center of it was Jaz.

Jaz followed the Path of Sekhmet, a goddess of plague and destruction, an unusual pick for a magician focusing on being a healer. Nevertheless, in her studies, Jaz picked up some combat lessons and magic, and summoning a combat avatar was the fruits of her efforts in her studies.

The enemy magician in the air started to fly around and waved her magical shield around, as opposed to staying still while bombarding the magicians, in an effort to throw the large combat avatar away, but the combat avatar rooted itself in the shield with the blades on its feet, rendering any attempt of dislodging the avatar impossible.

The enemy magician was left in a difficult position. She couldn't attack the magician attacking her with her shields up, and if she were to lower them, Jaz would take that opportunity to attack the magician before she can defend properly.

Sadie decided to help Jaz out, and summoned the Wings of Isis, which improves all of her magical capabilities, enables flight, and projects her voice. She took to the skies, and started hurling blasts of elemental magic at the enemy magician in the air while throwing in Divine Words in the mix.

None of her spells hit. Any elemental magic was intercepted by beams of light from the purple spheres of light still hovering behind the enemy magician. Divine Words simply didn't work against her, as if the enemy cancelled any magic thrown at her.

Jaz, in her combat avatar, started to slash at the magical shield that the magician put up. The glass like substance showed no sign of giving in at first, but started to gradually crack a bit with each slash.

Carter decided to give his last attack strategy another go. He pushed his combat avatar from a defensive position to a standing up one, and jumped above the enemy magician. Carter twisted his combat avatar in midair, and slammed his Crook at the shield the magician that Jaz rooted herself on.

The shield instantly shattered and the Crook kept going, and slammed into the magician behind them. The woman took the hit to her torso, and flew back into the wall of a nearby building in an instant, with a sickening crunch.

The wall where the woman crashed into now had a large crater on its side. The magician laid across the crater in an eagle-spread fashion. The woman's cloak was now in tatters, and her body was covered in bumps, scrapes, and blood.

Walt, who was standing next to the building at the time, opened his hand and let out seven small ribbons of different colors. As soon as they left Walt's hands, the ribbons grew in length and width. In only a few seconds, each ribbon elongated to large pieces of solid colored cloth several meters in length. The rainbow colored pieces of cloth, directed by Walt, flew towards the woman smashed on the side of the wall.

The Ribbons wrapped around the woman, and in moments, the woman looked like a rainbow colored mummy. The mummy then fell from the wall, hitting the ground with a thud. The figure inside struggled to get, to no avail. The Ribbons of Hathor were designed to bind deities and dangerous spirits after all.

Walt ran over to the bundle, while Carter and Jaz dispelled their combat avatars and Sadie flew to where the other three gathered. All of the magicians were in different states after the battle with the strange magicians. Sadie had gotten her jacket and various other articles of clothing tattered from being hit by the stray beam of light. Carter was visibly sweating from having to spend so much energy from both maintaining his combat avatar and defending himself from the beams of light. Otherwise, he was just fine. Jaz fared worse than Carter-she tanked the beam of light with nothing but her combat avatar, and spent most of her magic on combating the magician. She was laced in bruises and small cuts from debris. Walt took the least damage out of all the magicians, since he wasn't in involved in direct combat.

"What was that?" asked Jaz, gesturing to the still struggling multi-colored mummy on the ground.

Walt started to reply, "I don't kno-"

"Ατλας (Atlas)"

There was suddenly a pressure in the air that wasn't there before. Again, Carter ears' clearly registered, against all logic, a Greek magician clearly using Egyptian words for her spells. Just like last time, no Hieroglyphics or any kind of symbols showed up anywhere, however Carter registered the powerful ripples through the Duat just from that word being spoken. The last time a spell invoked he had felt such a strong presence through the Duat from a _spell_ was when Sadie casted "Ma'at," the most powerful Divine word, in the Hall of Ages. However, the spell the Greek magician used was...different.

Unlike Divine Words or other Hieroglyph magic, in which one casts magic through channeling magic in the words they speak, write, or chant, Carter felt that this spell the enemy magician used was clearly different. Instead of the spell achieving a something through magic, it almost seemed as if the other magician was instead ordering the rules of reality to do her bidding.

Carter then felt more ripples in the Duat, not nearly as powerful as the last, coming from the direction where the woman was bound. There was a ripping sound, and Carter tried to move to see what was going on. But he couldn't. His body responded, but it was like trying to move while encased in granite. The molecules in the air simply refused to move. The other magicians in his line of sight weren't able to move either.

Then he saw the enemy magician move into his line of sight. In her hands was a small fancy dagger.

It was a peculiar dagger, not made of any metal Carter has ever seen or heard about. It had an odd unusual shape: crooked and utterly impractical for combat. The knife was clearly not for fighting, but despite its bluntness, something in the thin multicolored blade inscribed with Greek symbols that Carter can't begin to decipher just screamed _wrong_ to his mind.

The enemy magician plunged the dagger in Sadie's arm. There was no large amount of blood, but the results were instantaneous.

The Wings of Isis instantly vanished, leaving Sadie floating in midair, and there was a burst of magical energy erupting from Sadie. The magical energy seeped into the air after leaving Sadie's body, and was absorbed by the magician, now glowing, almost greedily _eating_ the magical energy pouring out of Sadie. After the energy stopped slipping out of Sadie, Carter felt that something...was missing about Sadie. It felt like something came and took out most of her essence. The magical staff that she was holding shrank back into a rod.

The witch pulled out her dagger from Sadie's arm, spilling blood on the fresh snow, and moved closer to Sadie. Carter didn't like it. Sadie was already unconscious after getting her magical energy stolen by their enemy, Carter could feel it. Whatever she was doing now to Sadie couldn't be good.

Carter has never felt so powerless since starting his career as a magician. He was the Pharaoh of Egypt, and he couldn't protect his own sister, and was helpless against this...this... _witch_. What is he supposed to do now? As it turned out, Carter didn't have to do anything.

Several obsidian daggers launched themselves at the woman, who merely raised a shield to block them. She then slowly turned around to find which fool attempted to attack her.

 **"That's enough."**

"Walt's" voice boomed across the clearing, but Walt was now completely gone, and the God of the Dead, Anubis, was now standing in his place. Gone were Walt's warm brown eyes, Anubis' pitch black ones glaring hatefully at the poor unfortunate soul that bothered Sadie Kane were in their place.

 **"I do not know why you are here, how you aren't dead, or how you know the forbidden arts, but at this point I don't care, _Witch of Betrayal,_ "**

For the first time in the battle, the enemy magician, no, the _witch_ , looked hesitant, like even it recognizes the danger in front of it.

 **"You will live, dying is too much of a gift for you at this point."**

Anubis snapped his fingers, and the pressure in the air dissipated. Carter found that he could move freely again. Sadie fell to the ground next to the enemy magician. A piece of linen appeared out of thin air and wrapped itself around Sadie's wound. The enemy magician still hasn't moved. Carter and Jaz moved to help the Eye of Anubis, but Anubis gestured at them to stop.

"Um, Jaz? Let's let Anubis here handle the situation here, alright?" said Carter to Jaz.

Jaz nodded, and took a fearful step away from Walt, before running to Carter and grabbing his arm. "We got to go."

Carter took a look at Sadie's collapsed form, and then back at Anubis. Anubis only gestures at Carter to leave, so Carter follows Jaz to take cover behind a flipped car.

Anubis turned his attention back to the witch. He took out Jaz's potion, and chugged all of it. After finishing it, Anubis dropped the clay vial on the ground. He snarled at his foe, and said,

 **"Prepare yourself, _witch._ "**

And just like that, Anubis disappeared. And then he was right next to the witch in a blink. Almost like teleportation. ' _No_ ,' thought Carter, ' _he just moved so quickly that I couldn't track him._ '

The vengeful god kneed the woman in the stomach, and Carter could so the witch doubling over around the god's knee, blood flying from her mouth, before she flew backwards fifty meters in the air at breakneck speeds before halting in midair above the stretch of water next to the parking lot.

The witch howled, and the world obeyed. A blinding wind stormed out from behind her. Only the immense amount of magical energy emanating from the direction of the witch warned Carter and Jaz. They ducked their heads from watching the fight and hastily set magical defenses that might protect them behind the car.

Anubis only raises his hand, and long rolls of linen appeared, covering Sadie's vulnerable body on the ground in a semi-sphere that would protect her from anything the witch could possibly hurl at the god.

The wind tore through the battlefield. Literally. The sick, foul wind scratched the earth, tore apart the metal of the cars still on the parking lot, scratched away at any and all surfaces, and started blowing away smaller objects, and larger ones were starting to drift on the ground. Even the car that Carter and Jaz were hiding behind started drifting back, until it was tossed up into the air by the wind and crashed into the magical barrier that Carter and Jaz hastily set up. The snow picked up by the wind simply made the sense of vision worthless.

And through it all, Anubis just stood there. The wind never even touched him, instead simply flowing around him as if an invisible shield prevented anything from touching him. The death god started walking forward, in a way similar to a dog prowling towards its prey. The clothes Walt was wearing flashed, and turned into ancient Egyptian battle wear.

The armor consisted of a cloth kilt wrapped around Anubis' torso and legs, like a skirt. On the upper body, Anubis only wore a simple white linen shirt and bronze plate armor. Golden bracelets were worn on both arms, giving Anubis a look of royalty.

The enemy magician intensified the wind as Anubis walked ever closer. Soon, anything nailed to the ground not made out of stone was simply worn down to the ground. Windows on cars and on the nearby buildings cracked from the intense wind pressure. The car that slammed into Jaz's and Carter's shield was picked up again, until the only cover the two magicians had was their magical barrier, and even that would've broke a long time ago if Carter and Jaz weren't constantly reapplying and upgrading it.

Anubis still showed no sign of discomfort as he pressed forward against the wind, and then the witch seemed to get desperate. The air seemed to freeze over and over again around Anubis, the snow and debris halting in place and then blowing away and then halting again as the witch tried to halt the god. When that didn't work, the witch stopped casting those spells and started throwing bolts of lightning at the deity.

This time Anubis did defend against them. He raised his right hand in the direction of the lightning bolts, as if to catch them. A shield of darkness sprang forth at his fingertips, stopping the lightning in its tracks. The magician started moving her mouth up and down and a rapid pace, but Carter couldn't make them out from the booming of the thunder and the screaming of the wind.

More purple magical spheres appeared behind the witch, easily a couple hundred in number. And they started charging. At the same time, the earth started shifting. Hands of earth erupted from the ground in an attempt to halt the deity on his mission.

None of the earthen hands reached their target. Before any of them could so much touch Anubis, he materialized a pitch-black obsidian khopesh and wand, and slashed right through every one while moving forward. He didn't deviate from his path, but simply removed any obstacles in his way.

By the time Anubis finished his last stroke into the last hand, he was less than ten feet away from the water's edge. The enemy magician started blasting Anubis with her beams of light, and unlike her previous attacks, these worked.

If the previous blasts from those magical spheres were like rain, these blasts were more akin to a rapid artillery fire. They sacrificed firing rate for power, and they worked spectacularly.

Unlike the other spells cast at him, Anubis didn't take them head on. Instead, he quickly dodged the beams of light at inhuman speed. Wherever he stood before, there was a new five foot deep crater in the ground.

Anubis was caught in a deadly dance. Even moving at supersonic speeds, one misstep, one mistake, could permanently harm his host and lead to the death of his friends. Just like his friends earlier before, Anubis was stuck in the magician's bombardment. Any magical shield raised up would shatter in seconds. Any attempt to try to counterattack would most likely fail. As a result, Anubis was stuck only dodging and blocking the blasts of magic.

The witch, sensing Anubis' weakness, formed even more glowing spheres of death and increased their firing rate.

Just when Anubis looked to be on the verge of defeat, Walt's form flashed once more. Suddenly, Anubis was wielding his own combat avatar. Like the others', the combat avatar was a large humanoid figure surrounding Anubis. But that's where the similarities ended. It was pitch black, and had the head of a feral jackal, not unlike the head of the god whenever Carter met him before his possession of Walt (Sadie would claim that Anubis looked like a perfectly fine boy, but Carter doubted her sanity at times, so he took her word with a grain of salt). Anubis' combat avatar wielded both a khopesh and a wand, and like Carter's, wore only a linen kilt to battle along with golden accessories on its arms and neck.

The avatar stretched its head up and _howled_ , speaking some kind of Egyptian that Carter couldn't quite make out, and quite similarly to the enemy magician, the world obeyed his command. It was most surely a spell, but like the enemy magician, no hieroglyphic appeared.

Instantly, a pitch black barrier that seemed much more solid than any defense raised by the other magicians, bar the enemy, appeared before Anubis, and unlike his previous shields, this one _held._

Oh, sure, the shield was still deteriorating at an alarming rate, but it was holding up much better than any of the other shields.

As the witch kept increasing the intensity and rate of fire of her bombardment, Anubis only stood behind his defense and started chanting something. The weapons in the combat avatar's hands glowed blue with intensity, and around Anubis, various magical circles appeared.

Unlike the ones summoned by his foe, the blue magical circles summoned around Anubis were clearly Egyptian in origins. Hieroglyphics covered ever spare space in the circle, and Carter, with his enhanced eyesight granted from Horus, could make out various symbols, including the symbols for "Summoning," "Power," and "Capture".

A few seconds after the magical circles were formed, they disappeared, and various objects took their place.

Some of the circles summoned huge jackals easily ten feet long. Others gathered magical energy in large spheres that were on the verge of detonating from the slightest disturbance in their shapes. The last objects summoned were several odd long pieces of linen inscribed with ridiculous amounts of even more Hieroglyphics.

Anubis let his shield fall, and the long bands of linen instantly sprang into action. They flew around rapidly around Anubis, his orbs of divine power, and his jackals like electrons orbiting their atoms to provide protection. The blasts of magic from the enemy were now unable to penetrate the shield of linen, but even the shields of linen couldn't reduce the force behind the blasts to nothing.

Anubis in his combat quickly moved to dodge the blasts aimed at him and blocked the ones he couldn't, and his jackals mirrored his moves. With a gesture with his left arm, Anubis sent his magical bombs at the enemy, and they obliged, weaving around in the air avoiding the blasts of magic while traveling to the target. Whenever a stray laser beam does hit one of them, the linen shield was usually enough to prevent any damage.

However, the witch seemingly caught on to the dangers of the objects flying towards her, and waved her left arm at them. Every single magical circle immediately stopped firing and started spinning. An incredibly short time after that, every magical circle shot a thin, but incredibly dense and powerful penetrating laser at Anubis' spheres, resulting in their premature explosions that released black smoke which cloaked the entire parking lot.

When the smoke cleared up, Carter and Jaz were treated with a surprise. The witch, still floating in midair, was wrapped around with the rolls of linen that came out of orbit from the jackals that Anubis summoned. As each second passed, the witch was wrapped in more and more linen, resembling a mummy. Anubis kept chanting the strange Egyptian that the witch before was using, presumably to restrain the witch, and soon enough, the mummy stopped struggling, and then the linen suddenly sagged.

Anubis looked alarmed, and quickly unraveled the linen that moments before had a person in them. There was nothing inside the linen. She escaped? But how? The only method Carter could think of is that the witch teleported, but to his knowledge, no teleportation magic or portal would've allowed the witch to escape.

Anubis' combat avatar turned around and looked at the sky. Only then did Carter notice the ominous glow coming from behind them. Floating 50 meters in the air perhaps 10 meters behind them was the witch, with an unprecedented number of spheres of destruction floating behind her. If the number of spheres before numbered in the hundreds, they now numbered over a thousand, and more. So many that they blotted out the sky with their number.

Anubis glanced at the number of spheres and grimaced. He clearly didn't like his odds. He dissolved his combat avatar, and gestured at the shield covering Sadie's body on the battlefield. More linens appeared, and a glowing black shield then covered the linen, granting Sadie absolute protection against virtually anything.

Anubis turned his head towards the other magicians, and yells, "Go find cover, I'll deal with her!"

Wasting no time, Carter and Jaz picked up their gear and ran away from the battle as fast as they could.

Normally, Carter would've never had retreated, but the enemy this time was just too much, though Carter hated to admit it. Her magic hit too hard, and seemed to be able to deal with anything that the magicians could throw at her, even the Seven Ribbons of Hathor, Ribbons guaranteed to bind anything with Divinity, failed to work against her. Furthermore, Carter just had little to no viable way to attack her. Carter's main strategy against mages was to block magic that the enemy hurls at him with his combat avatar and shields and then defeating the enemy up close. That just wasn't viable against the enemy mage. Any shield that Carter could summon were no match against the enemy, and even with the Pharaoh's arms, Carter simply couldn't go on the offensive without leaving himself open to enemy spell fire. Even Anubis, a _god_ , was having trouble defeating her, and from the looks of it, even he was on the verge of being overwhelmed.

So when Carter and Jaz heard the explosions behind them as they ran from the battlefield, Carter didn't look back.

* * *

Anubis cursed his fortunes. He hated the idea possessing Walt, but it had to be done. He couldn't allow any for any error, so even becoming the Eye of Anubis was a potential hindrance when facing his opponent.

His opponent, a soul that should've died millennia ago.

A mage with no mortal blood, capable of casting spells on the level of the gods.

A mage, who sadly in this time of the world, was still able to use _that_.

High Speed Divine Words, or at least that's what he heard modern magical historians call it, but even they are skeptical of their existence. Instead of the typical Divine Words, which magicians channel magical power through to materialize its effects, High Speed Divine Words is another language onto itself, and using it _commands_ the world to do your bidding. It was considered semi-forbidden even back in the days of yore. Why wouldn't it be? It was the language of the gods, and when used the wrong way, could wreck absolute havoc in the world.

Almost no one should have the ability to use it in this day and age. Any practitioners were usually ancient magicians that still live in the modern age, like Iskandar. In fact, the knowledge of how to use the language of the gods disappeared from the face of the House of Life since the defeat of Cleopatra the Seventh, and the gods saw no reason to reintroduce it to the House who were imprisoning them. Even Thoth, the god of knowledge and the only deity the House of Life used to tolerate, refused to part the knowledge how to use those words to the House of Life.

Oh, it could still be taught in this day and age, but fortunately, most modern vocal chords cannot replicate the language, so even the few teachers of it like the Witch of the Island and the Shadow cannot just dispense the knowledge to just anyone. However, anyone who can use it are on a whole different level than the typical magician, even the Blood of the Pharaohs while bonded with a god. Only a user of High Speed Divine Words or a deity can conceivably beat another one, even if the magician was the Pharaoh.

So when Carter and Jaz ran off the battlefield, Anubis breathed a sigh of relief.

Anubis turned back to the magician. He needed to end the fight fast. It wasn't just because of the increasing collateral damage, but the limits of Walt's body. As a member of the Blood of the Pharaohs, Walt is a perfect candidate for the host of a god, but even they had limits. And Anubis has been pushing those limits, even with the potion that Jaz provided them.

The female magician, no, Medea started attacking first. Beams of light rained down from the heavens, threatening to destroy anything and everything in their way.

His dogs fell. Faced with even more magical attacks from before, even their shield and agility weren't able to hold against the witch's attack.

Anubis dismissed his khopesh, and opted for Walt's staff. A staff would come in handier than a khopesh, and can be used defensively with the boomerang shaped wand. As the beams of light closed in on him, Anubis spoke the forbidden language of the gods again.

Instead of blocking the blasts of magic this time, Anubis simply prevented any of the blasts from hitting them. Space distorted, and any beam that would've hit him was violently diverted around him. Unlike his shield however, Anubis cannot move this form of protection and cannot move through it without ripping apart his mortal host. It was simply to stall to give him time to think up a strategy to defeat the witch. However, there was little time left before Walt will die from magical overcharge.

Fortunately, the use of High Speed Divine Words costs far less than traditional Egyptian Sorcery. Traditional Sorcery is about the manipulation of magical energy and exerting that energy to enforce your own will upon the will of the World. High Speed Divine Words are just that, _words_. They are words with significant importance, commanding the World to do as you say. As a result, little magical energy is used. That means that Anubis could perform high-level magic without taxing Walt's body by a significant amount if he also used High Speed Divine Words, and use them he did, throughout the battle.

After around half a minute of Medea bombarding his shield, Anubis had a sudden epiphany. If you can't beat them, join them. With that, Anubis _chanted_ , and innumerable magical circles appeared on the ground around him.

The circles flashed, and dozens upon dozens of _shabti_ , ancient funeral statues, appeared in them. They were all life-sized, and were of both genders. They all appeared to be adults, wore the clothing of a magician of the House of Life, and carried with them weapons, ranging from the usual staff and wand, to more unconventional, like the shield bearers and spear users .The attention to detail on them were incredible, so lifelike that you can mistake for living, breathing men and woman.

That was the point.

The circles flashed once again, and the shabti came to life.

The mud dolls prepared battle stances. The ones with wands and staves chanted, and great pools of magical energy emerged in front of each of them. They were preparing something, something big. The spear wielders readied their enchanted spears in firing positions, while the shield-bearers positioned as cover.

When all his _shabti_ were ready, Anubis dissolved the shield, and it was absolute chaos.

The beams of light instantly slammed into the shield-bearing _shabti_ , and most of them were barely able to remain standing despite the magic absorbing shields. The spear wielding _shabti_ threw their magical spears, and then were promptly turned to dust by the rain of magic. The spell casting _shabti_ launched their own spells against the witch, varying from their own blasts of magic to spells meant for binding foes, while the witch herself just hovered, as if looking down on everyone.

And Anubis himself?

He was launching dozens of obsidian funeral daggers and swaths of dark magic at the witch.

However, no matter how many spells and objects the god and his allies hurled at Medea, the enemy always had more. Enchanted spears were either redirected or destroyed by the magical blasts. Any kind of binding magic simply didn't work, and the ropes were slashed by blades of wind. The _shabtis_ ' magic was met, and overwhelmed by the rain of destruction. Anubis himself was materializing obsidian weapons and hurling it at the witch, and shot waves of dark magic with his hands, but even his attempts were met with little success. Shields deteriorated from the excess magic poured into them, and the shield-bearers were blasted to oblivion. The _shabti_ magicians followed shortly afterwards. More replaced them, but production couldn't keep up with the destruction of the _shabti_.

Anything used against the witch's magic was matched with ten blasts, and if ten wasn't enough, then a hundred.

Soon enough, Anubis only had a small handful of allies with him, and they were all repeatedly casting only defensive spells to prevent the last of the allies from dying off.

'If only I can channel more power,' thought Anubis as he deflected another round of spell fire.

It was definitely an option, if a suicide one. Jaz's potion was beginning to wear off. Soon enough, Walt's body would not be able to channel any more magic, and would be burned to a crisp if more power was channeled. At the same time, defeat or retreat wasn't an option, for what would happen to Sadie if Walt was to die? If his host died while the witch hasn't been defeated, then Anubis couldn't do anything to help Sadie.

After another twenty seconds, Anubis' twelve _shabti_ allies were reduced to five, and Anubis was on the edge of defeat. The rain of light grew in intensity and frequency, and in less than a minute, Anubis would either kill his host from over-use of magic or simply losing to the rain of spells.

Then one shield _shabti_ fell, and turned to dust. A few seconds later, a magician _shabti_ joined its sibling's fate. Then another, and another.

Soon enough, no _shabti_ were left, and Anubis was standing alone against the onslaught of magic. Anubis' hourglass of time loomed closer and closer. Right before the last figurative sands fell, Anubis' world grinded to a halt.

 _'Walt?_ _'_ Anubis communicated telepathically to his host. _'Are you willing to give up anything for Sadie Kane?'_

 _'Yes,_ _'_ was the instant reply. No hesitation, not even a twitch in his host's figurative eyebrow in his mindscape. _'Next to her's, my short life doesn't matter. There really is nothing escaping this curse, is there?'_

 _'Well,'_ Anubis replied, _'we both knew on some level that this ultimately probably wouldn't work out. This outcome is still completely unexpected though. Fighting against what should still be a ghost.'_

Walt was quiet for a moment, before sighing a resigned breath, _'_ _Well,_ _cheating death is already a grave criminal act anyway, right? I guess I'm ready to face my punishment'_

And just like that, Anubis gathered all his essence in Walt's body. Walt's body glowed, and his mortal flesh burned away in the dark fire fuming from him. And then Anubis revealed his true form.

The true form of a deity is all the deity's essence is coalesced in one spot. Any and all manifestations of the Deity, no matter which iteration or pantheon the deity has combines as one. Almost every deity has a true form, no matter which region they are from, what time they come from, whether they are Norse, Greek, Egyptian, Hindu, Babylonian, or even Shinto. It is their ultimate trump card, their final attack, their last resort against the most fearsome of foes. After ascending to a true form, a deity can wield tremendous strength and power. However, it comes with several drawbacks. Virtually any other being will die upon laying their gazes upon it, even demigods, as mortals cannot perceive a higher being's true existence.

A demonic jackal's head was the last thing visible in the glow before a brilliant dark flash enveloped the area, completely blowing away all the beams of magic by the witch and incinerating every living thing in the immediate vicinity.

A heartbeat later, the flash disappeared, and the battle was over.

As if on cue, fireworks shot up into the sky above the New York City skyline, celebrating the start of the New Year and hopes of a luck until the next ones.

Unfortunately for the ones who knew the true nature of the world, it would be known as the Year of Incidents.

* * *

When Sadie regained consciousness, the first thing she registered was a feeling of powerlessness. Something just didn't feel right about her body, as if something was missing from her. The world was fuzzy patches of light and darkness, no details as far as she can see.

Sadie blinked, and suddenly the world came into focus.

She was lying in something similar to a hospital bed in one of the newly renovated rooms of Brooklyn House. A bandage was wrapped around her left arm, which felt incredibly sore. Healers, including Jaz, buzzed around, examining the patients' conditions. After the Battle for Brooklyn House and it was clear that the war with Apophis was nearing, a formerly destroyed section of the mansion was converted into an infirmary to treat the wounded. She sat up. There were ten beds total, and two others were taken.

One was Lance, an eleven-year old blond trainee from South Africa that got hurt in a training exercise that required him a week's rest in the infirmary. He messed up in a preliminary lesson on controlling his magic, and was currently on an iPad presumably playing games while a healer doted on him two beds to Sadie's right.

The only other bed with a patient was in the far corner of the room with the closed curtains, so Sadie couldn't see who it was. Wait a minute, since when did anyone get hurt like that? Sadie hoped that whoever was behind the curtains was going to be fine. It was surrounded by healers whispering to each other while others brought in more and more potions and bandages.

While watching the healers buzzing around the mysterious patient in the far end of the room, Sadie reviewed the last things she recalled. She was with Carter, Jaz, and Walt to observe a magical anomaly at a department store nearby, but was then ambushed by...an enemy magician? A godling? A minor deity? She recalled something to do with Greek She recalled the bloody magician whooping her and her friends butts, and then they managed to capture her right? But then while looking away, she recalled her body, no, the _air,_ simply freezing in place, and her group of magicians were unable to move. And then the magician moved in front of her, pulling out a really cool purplish dagger that Sadie would've wanted a replica of, and stabbed her in the arm.

It didn't feel particularly painful, and even if it did, Sadie doubted that she could scream at that time due to the freezing spell in the air.

The dagger in her arm only started feeling wrong when something inside her struggled for a second, and then vanished. Sadie then remembered waking up in the infirmary.

After about a minute of staring up into space, Jaz finally seemed to notice that one of her patients were awake.

Jaz turned to a nearby healer, and said, "Go get Carter," before walking towards Sadie from her seat next to the mysterious patient.

She walked through three healers bringing more supplies, earning fresh glares in her direction and sat on a chair next to Sadie's bed. The blond had an expression of relief on her face as she looked at Sadie, "How are you feeling Sadie?"

Sadie took a moment to stare at Jaz before replying. "I'm great, I'm totally not completely disoriented," Sadie shakes her arms in Jaz's direction, "Now tell me what happened?"

Just then, the healer that Jaz ordered to get Carter returned, with Carter in tow. He looked miserable. On most days, he looked like a junior professor teaching some class that Sadie wouldn't know the name of, he now looked completely out of it. His clothing were wrinkled, and his entire demeanor screamed drowsiness and disorientation. But it was clear on his face how much he worried for his sister.

He half ran to the seat next to Jaz, "Are you alright?"

Sadie's eye twitched. It was clear that she was knocked out, but seriously? It wasn't as if her life was forfeit or something.

"For Ma'at's sake," Sadie started fiercely, making both Jaz and Carter flinch, "Would one of you please tell me what happened? I know I am important and all, but I kinda want to know what happened after I was knocked out, alright? What time is it anyway?"

It turned out it was New Years Day, the morning after their battle with the mysterious magician. Jaz and Carter then explained what happened after Sadie lost consciousness. How Anubis took full control of Walt's body. How Anubis and the unknown magician duked it out while Jaz and Carter had to take cover. How the two foes both used a strange way to cast spells in the Egyptian language. How the witch pulled out her trump card. How Anubis ordered them to leave, and the bright flash of light that concluded the battle.

"When we came back, we got you out of Anubis' shield, and then contacted Brooklyn House for help," said Jaz

Sadie drank it all in. Carter and Jaz's descriptions of the events that occurred, but something, no someone was missing from all of that.

"Where's Walt?"

The noise in the infirmary continued, but neither Jaz nor Carter spoke.

A growing sense of despair started to fill Sadie. "Where is WALT?" she half-shouted.

Carter hesitated, and then said, "Well, remember how channeling too much magic could make you..."

"...literally burn up? Is that what Anubis did? How is that possible? Walt is a Blood of the Pharaohs, and he has plenty of practice channeling Anubis' power. Anubis wouldn't have done that to Walt either-"

Jaz made an arm motion signaling for Sadie to stop talking, and then said, "We have no concrete proof yet, but we have suspicions."

But Sadie wasn't listening. "Walt's in there right?" Sadie pointed at the closed off section of the infirmary. "Let me see him."

Carter and Jaz didn't move a muscle. "Sadie, we cannot let you see him," said Carter in a tone that spoke of the seriousness of the issue.

Sadie glared at Carter, "If you don't let me see him, I will use your secret name to force you!"

The room suddenly stilled to a halt. Even the healers attending their urgent patient stopped to watch the commotion. A secret name is no small thing. It was a fifth of the Egyptian soul, and anyone who really knew someone else's secret name can make said person do almost whatever they want. However, the only ones who can tell someone else their name is said person or someone really close to that person.

Sadie learned Carter's secret name over a year ago, and since then has been pretty cool about not forcing Carter to do anything he might not want to do, but that is still too much power in one's little sister.

"No." Carter's face was serious, uncompromising, like a wall of stone.

Sadie glared back, and every being in the room continued watching the staring contest between the two siblings, until Jaz intervened.

"Sadie, Walt is currently in critical condition. We are barely keeping him alive as we speak, and there is a very high likelihood that he will never wake up again. There is a talk going around to lock him in stasis."

Sadie turned her head away from Carter, and said to Jaz, "In stasis."

Jaz nodded. "It would be somewhat similar to how Carter found Zia. Walt will be placed in suspended animation, and while in it, he will be fine until we can find a way to treat him."

Sadie accepted that explanation, if a bit reluctantly. As the signs of conflict died down, the healers in the room resumed their work in keeping Walt alive.

Then Sadie had an epiphany. "What happened to the magician we were fighting?"

Carter shrugged, "We tied her up, put half a hundred different spells that prevents the captive from casting a spell, speaking, moving, or manipulate magic of any kind. She's currently gagged chained to the floor in one of the rooms on the third floor."

Sadie looked at Carter for a second and blinked, "Isn't that overkill?"

Carter said, "I have...a hunch. You know how we pour magic into our chants to make them work?"

Sadie nodded, and gestured for Carter to continue.

"Well, I think instead of actually casting spells, she is actually just speaking, and some how the blasts of magic just forms out of the air."

"Wait, wait, wait a minute," interrupted Jaz, "Is that even possible?"

"By all rights it shouldn't, but to be honest, we are only scratching the surface of recovering the lost magic since Egypt fell to the Romans. It isn't impossible that there is some magic that can do that. Furthermore," Carter continued, "When we arrived at the scene of the battle, we found the enemy magician face down on the ground, but she looked different from when we fought her."

Sadie took in the news, "Different? What do you mean by that?"

Jaz replied instead of Carter, "You know how the enemy magician was wearing some fancy cloak?" Sadie nodded. "Well, when we found her, she was just wearing a dark winter coat, a torn up one, but there was no cloak on her body. And, we found this." Jaz pulled out something from her pocket and held it in front of Sadie for her to see.

It looked like some kind of tarot card. On one side was a fancy design with a hexagon in the center, and one the other side was...

"Caster?" read Sadie as she squinted at the card. It had the image of a old, wizened man wearing a cloak, carrying a staff, and holding a book. It was the stereotypical image of a European wizard. Sadie almost dismissed the card as nothing majorly important until she felt the magic coming from the card. It made her confused. It didn't seem like any Ancient Egyptian artifact or spell she ever seen. In fact, it somehow seemed to be on the other side of the spectrum.

"What is this?" asked Sadie as she gave the card back to Jaz.

"We don't know," said Carter. "All attempts we made so far to investigate what it is has led to failure. I actually contacted Zia and Amos asking if they ever seen anything like this. Apparently the answer is no, and they and several scholars are coming tomorrow to examine it."

"Wouldn't it be simpler to just ask the enemy magician directly?"

Carter shrugged. "She hasn't woken up yet, though I think she will soon. The biggest problem is what to do with her."

Sadie blinked. "What do you mean?"

Carter gave her a look. "In case you haven't noticed, the woman just screams _Greek_. First of all, any spells she casted had Greek lettering on them. Furthermore, I did some investigating." Carter pulls out a necklace from his shirt pocket. "I found this on her person while we tied her up. Take a look."

Jaz and Sadie took a minute to look at the necklace. It was silver, a valuable metal in all periods of human history, and had a design of two torches crossed with each other.

Jaz looked back up from the necklace. "Ok, I must be missing something here, so can you just tell us what this means?"

Carter took a deep breath. "Two torches crossed is the symbol of the Greek Goddess of Magic."

* * *

 **AN: Sorry for the long delay. Writer's block and all, and I have been focusing on school.**

 **First things first. I apologize if the battle was poorly written. It's my first time writing a battle, so please leave feedback!**

 **As for the magical analysis side. First of all, I had an enlightening discussion with one of the reviewers about just what would the Riordanverse Divine Words be classified as. I decided it would be something on the lines of Runic Magic from the Age of the Gods. It matches pretty much perfectly, especially since the Primordial Runes fits in with what we know about Egyptian Magic.**

 **As for High-Speed-Divine-Words absolutely trumping it, well, it's like this (if you don't know. I you know, skip this section,) HSDW are a level higher than Runes. It is upright High level Magic (Divine Mysteries) after saying one word. In the Nasuverse, it is magic that no human can use anymore. In my fic, HSDW can still be used by some people, namely ancient magi, Blood of the Pharaohs, very old bloodlines, and demigods (but no legacies). HSDW is the literal language of the gods, and similarly to the Unified Language, will sound look some other language to the hearer. In Carter's, Jaz's, Walt's, and Sadie's perspective, it sounded like the enemy witch is saying Ancient Egyptian.**

 **As for Anubis also knowing and recognizing it, remember, HSDW is the language of the _gods_ , so it would be odd for him not to know it. As for how it would place in the Riordanverse, Iskandar mentions that lots incredibly powerful** **magic was "lost" after the fall of Egypt, not just the Path of the Gods. HSDW is one of them.**

 **Anubis having a true form might be twisting the canon a bit, but I think it makes sense. I do not believe that the Egyptian gods are inferior to the Greek and Roman ones in any shape or form. In fact, it has been mentioned, I believe, once or twice that some of the forms gods can take can incinerate any mortal who looks at them. Totally doesn't sound like a true form.**

 **Next, for people asking if Percy will get the Archer card, or will Shirou come over and kick ass, the answer is no. We still don't know how the Class Cards work exactly, but my guess is that the class card must first accept the user in some way, since Shirou said that only one Heroic Spirit could answer his call, and that it is shown that the cards somewhat have a will of their own, the most prominent example being the Gilgamesh card. Would EMIYA ever accept Percy Jackson as his wielder? Doubtful, since Percy's way of thinking is completely opposite of Archer's. Percy's fatal flaw is that he will never let go of his friends, while EMIYA has continually left his friends behind without hesitation or guilt. If anything, Percy would fit best with Rider, who over the course of her life did everything to protect her sisters, even if they ended up hating her and becoming a monster.**

 **As for Shirou coming over, this isn't a story about Shirou Emiya. The main focus here is Miyu and the Class Cards, as well as different mythologies clash as a result of these clash cards. However, Shirou will not appear anytime soon. Heck, if anything, I almost expect him to die in this fic. Anyway, Shirou wouldn't exactly to be able to beat the Olympians very easily. His only shot at beating them is summoning his RM before the deity took him seriously, or using Enkidu followed up with Harpe, but both requires the deities not taking Enkidu seriously (but then again, the canon power levels of the deities vary drastically). Don't get me wrong, I might write another crossover with Shirou as the main character, but who knows?**

 **As for how strong demigods are, I'll tell you this: IT MAKES NO SENSE. After a long debate about how strong demigods are, I'm finalizing it here and now. In this fic, they will have regular human Endurance and Agility, but have something like five times human strength in this fic. It was the only way for me to make sense of the series, and Rick Riordan doesn't seem to pay attention to this kind of stuff. For example, the way the Seven Demigods got from Athens back to Camp Half Blood should have shot them straight out of the stratosphere, if not outright killing everyone on board from the sudden acceleration and G-forces.**

 **Another way canon kinda breaks if you squinted at the details: Pegasi. Yes, they seem to have some reality bending powers that allow them to fly across entire oceans and countries in the span of a conversation, but what I'm concerned about is that they kinda ruin the entire point of quests. For example, why trek all the way across the country in The Lightning Thief if they can get all the way across in one day by Pegasi? Or what about The Titan's Curse? Pegasi carried the entire group back to New York from California in the span of a short conversation, yet Blackjack gets tired from a few hours of flying? What if they just traveled west by Pegasi instead? Inconsistency at best. So, I'll try not to mention how Pegasi or centaurs can bend the space-time continuum, or how time travels faster if you're in monster infected locations so I don't go crazy trying to make sense of it in this fic.**

 **Wow...looking back on this, I realize I have quite the rant going. I want to make something clear, I don't hate the PJO series. Frankly, I love it. It is one of the series that made me love reading in the first place, even outranking Harry Potter. It's just like with anything you grow up with, you'll start noticing inconsistencies. Don't get me wrong, I still love this series, but accepting the flaws is part of loving something, I suppose.**

 **Please leave a review. Reviews, honestly are the best thing a writer can receive. It gives us feedback on what we can improve on, and frankly, are just incredibly motivating and pleasing. Until next time, peace out.**


	5. Chapter 5

Percy was surprised when he discovered a ten-year old girl wearing nothing but a long black dress in the middle of the winter. It was peculiar, even under mythological standards. After all, the girl, named Miyu, appeared after what seems to be a freak lightshow over Manhattan. Since nothing out of the ordinary occurred in the past week and a half since Miyu was found, life went on. The event was peculiar, but in the supernatural world, it was nothing special, especially since it turns out the Greeks and Romans weren't the only ones out there. The campers were more worried about the legions of monsters roaming the continent ever since the Second Titanomachy and Gigantomachy, as just winning the "war" didn't solve all the problems.

For example, during the Gigantomachy, ever since the monster Python invaded the original temple of Delphi, the Oracle of Delphi has been unable to issue prophecies. Since Gaea's defeat, the Oracle of Delphi, Rachel Dare, still isn't able to issue prophecies. To solve this problem, the two demigod camps were cooperating in a joint mission in sending an enormous task-force to Greece to retake Delphi and defeat Python, a monster whose true nature still hasn't been completely agreed on by the researchers for both camps. After all, Python hasn't been truly reincarnated a single time it has been slain; all other records were usually red herrings of just one of many massive snake monsters that campers on both sides referred to as "Python" as a misnomer.

Several records claim Python is an enormous serpent, others a ferocious dragon. Others claim that the name "Python" is actually also a misnomer, but instead, the female dragon Delphyne guarded the temple, or perhaps both Delphyne and Python guarded the temple. Some records by some guy that Percy couldn't care less about even speculated that Python is indeed an earth spirit, which would make him virtually impossible to defeat without special equipment or divine help.

The goal of the quest seems simple: siege the temple of Delphi, defeat all of its monster defenders, kill Python and then secure the _Omphalos_ , the stone in which the Oracle of Delphi channels her abilities of prophecies.

In reality however, it is a lot more complex. First of all, the camps would have to transport all the demigods to Greece to start with. There were only so many possible ways to get an expedition one hundred and fifty strong all the way to Greece. The first way, entering via the Labyrinth, was labeled as too dangerous to attempt, even with a clear sighted mortal's assistance, so it was crossed off the drawing board right off the bat.

The next possible way to send that many demigods across was to ask the Egyptian's help with portals to transport them to Greece. However, Chiron overruled it the moment it was brought up. After the demigods' third encounter with the Magicians, Annabeth and Percy informed the counselors and Chiron about it, with all parties involved, including the Romans, took a _geas_ , a magical contract developed by the Hecate cabin, not to discuss the information with anyone until agreed upon by all parties. However, involving the Egyptians would break all pretenses of secrecy between the two groups, and could lead to more international mythological conflicts, in which both sides were wary of since their respective conflicts.

The last way, and the most costly but agreed upon, was to send build a new fleet of ships to sail the demigods into the _Mare Nostrum_ , or the Mediterranean.

However, all the ships had to be built first. It was ultimately decided upon by both camps that instead of building more Argo IIs, they would construct 5 ships total, one flagship, two warships, and two transports. Unlike the Quest of the Seven, in which one ship, the small Argo II was able to accommodate up to eight passengers, the five ships planned out were able to carry 150 demigods total. As a result, each of the new ships currently being built were noticeably larger than the Argo II. Camp Half-Blood, with its previous experience in ship building, was contributing to the construction of the Flagship along with one of the warships, while Camp Jupiter, with its better engineers and population with assistance from two senior Athena cabin members was building the other three.

The project was estimated to be complete by June 1st, and will be spearheaded by Reyna, one of the Praetors of Camp Jupiter, along with five former campers from New Rome to act as supervisors. The task-force will not only include demigods from both camps to act as fighters, but also included elder demigods such as historians, mappers, treasure hunters, and adventurers.

Conquering Delphi wasn't the only reason for the task-force. The secondary purposes of the task-forces included but weren't limited to: excavating the rest of Archimedes' findings, searching ruins all around the Mediterranean for lost secrets, weapons, artifacts, and establishing friendly relations with any other mythological groups they come across.

Miyu however, proved to be stranger than the sky-beam that appeared in the sky before she was found. From his observations while she was brought to camp and at camp, Percy noticed that Miyu looked like a foreigner in a strange land, and not just because she didn't speak English at first or because she was just brought into the mythological world, but because she constantly looked around and took in everything as if they were all novel to her, even the smartphones that the teens carried.

She was able to see through the Mist as if it wasn't there, something rare for mortals, and was incredibly wary of Piper after she used her charmspeakl to make Miyu feel more at ease, even if she didn't understand her. What's more, Miyu seemed a little too comfortable when she learned that gods and monsters existed, almost as if she already knew all along.

After bringing her to the camp, Chiron directed a few campers to do some background research on Miyu, but everything came up blank. The person known as "Miyu Emiya" simply doesn't exist. In fact, the city the girl named also doesn't exist, with no indication the name "Fuyuki City" is anywhere else either. The closest thing they found was a newspaper clipping of a outbreak of disease on some island in the Pacific a few decades ago, with the name of a "Kiritsugu Emiya" as the sole survivor. However, the paper trail ran cold after the article, and the only other mention of the name "Emiya" was a religious college girl also serving as a priest currently living in Rome. However, when the researchers brought this information to the attention of Chiron, he immediately halted all research, and declared he alone will observe Miyu.

Apparently whatever test Chiron had for Miyu, she passed, so she was allowed to attend camp activities as if she was a regular camper.

But anyway, after rescuing the girl and bringing her to camp, Percy's life at Camp Half-Blood returned to normal, that is, undergoing intense review of everything that he didn't learn because because of his 6 month coma and building the two half-finished ships in the camp harbor.

Sure, doing all that homework gives Percy an excuse to spend extra time with Annabeth, but the study sessions were nothing like how gossips say they went. Annabeth was a ruthless slave-driver, and forced all the review material into his head. Now, Percy's work ethic on anything not related to demigod activities was always terrible, which Percy would've blamed it on his ADHD and dylexic, but Annabeth had those same problems and was on track to being valedictorian.

Percy wasn't actually sure what he even wanted to do after finishing high school anyway. After discovering his heritage, Percy's life has always revolved around the supernatural, so he never gave a lot of thought into what he would do after. After all, the last Great Prophecy actually foretold his death, so he never actually expected to live long enough to worry about college. In fact, if the two camps never united, Percy probably never would've had a shot at college in the first place. After all, his grades weren't exactly impressive.

So everyday after camp activities, Annabeth would force Percy into a 2 hour long study session, something that broke a few days before winter break was over. Apparently she received an urgent call from her father talking about an urgent search for a cousin who ran away from home at the age of 14, and wanted Annabeth's help in looking for him. Annabeth protested dearly at first, but eventually gave in after an hour's lecture about the importance of family.

So since then, Percy's studying schedule got cancelled, and he was free to spend his free time doing activities he genuinely enjoyed doing for one glorious day before he gets to go back with his mom.

However, that was also the day that Percy received a very surprising piece of news.

Percy stood at the doorway to the Big House, staring up at the centaur with his jaw open. "So you are telling me that Miyu will be living with me for now?"

"Yes, Perseus Jackson," replied Chiron stoically. She is a mortal, regardless of any special circumstances. That means it is best for her to live in the mortal world. However, because of the same special circumstances, we cannot let her out of our sight. Because of this, I contacted several demigods' parents and asked them if any were willing to adopt Miyu for the foreseeable future. The first parent to respond was yours, Perseus."

Percy took a second to sink this all in. He considered the implications of having to live with another kid, and then said, "Well, can't she just live here? I mean, Annabeth lived at Camp Half-Blood for five years. Leo and Jason are also living at Camp Half-Blood until they head off to Camp Jupiter's college."

Chiron said, "Perseus Jackson, how many demigods do you think I have trained over the millennia?"

Percy blinked at the change in topic, and said, "Um, ten thousand maybe?"

Chiron chuckled, "A good guess, Perseus Jackson, but you're off. I've trained perhaps 50,000 demigods over the past 4000 years. What do you think I've learned about children over these long millennia?"

"Umm, you know how we think?"

"Close, but not quite, Perseus," Chiron said, "I've seen and worked with so many demigods, particularly children and teens, that I can identify traits of any child I meet."

Percy took a moment to think on that. "So you are like a psychologist or something."

"I wouldn't use that term to describe myself, but that is pretty accurate," said Chiron. "I feel as if she was very suppressed when she was young. Going out to the city will be good for her. Also, to be completely honest, Miyu is an enigma. We have no records saying she exists. No papers, no birth certificates, nothing, so I asked a few former campers to create an identity for her. Furthermore, you know how all demigods has a feel, or an aura to them, right?"

Percy nodded. It was true, after all. Every god that Percy has met always emanated something around them, whether it was recklessness, ozone, or simply the ocean breeze, every deity had them. It was true for demigods as well, but more prominent in more powerful ones. For example, Frank had a feel of the wild, while the Stolls, or rather, the Stoll now that Travis left for college, gave everyone an urge to check their pockets and to watch the son of Hermes' hands. These auras were usually incredibly subtle to nonexistent, but they were definitely there.

"Well," Chiron started, "I feel as if she isn't mortal, or wasn't."

Percy's eyes' widened. "How is that possible? If she wasn't born mortal, the Celestial Bronze would've hurt her. So far, none of the Imperial Gold weapons can scratch her either, though the same can't be said about clothing."

Chiron said, "I have a theory on that, actually. Why do these metals harm Egyptian magicians if the only divine or nonhuman aspect about them was hosting gods? Why is it that now Rachel can be cut be Celestial Bronze and Imperial Gold? Why do legacies from bloodlines over a millennia old still take damage, when legacies outside camp don't? What do you think about this?"

"Um, sir?" responded Percy, "I think you would be better off asking Annabeth about this." After all, Annabeth was always the one making split second decisions, coming up with trivia that would save their butts, and knowing this kind of thing. Percy on the hand, is more comparable to hired muscle. Not _dumb_ hired muscle, he was capable of coming up with genius plans if need be, but stuff like what Chiron is asking generally flew over his head.

"Percy, why don't we step inside for now? It is pretty chilly out here, after all."

Percy nodded, it was a slightly chilly outside. The camp's climate control is magical, but even it can't provide warmth and snow together.

Chiron stepped inside to let Percy into the house, and led Percy into the big blue building.

Chiron walked Percy to his office, and then to a desk in the center of the room, and spoke. "Percy, do you remember what I told you about what your sword can and cannot cut?"

Percy blinked in confusion, and brought out an ordinary blue fountain pen from his pocket, with the cap still on. He then uncapped it, and the pen grew from a pen into a three foot long Celestial Bronze sword. Percy held it out for Chiron to hold.

The sword, also called a _xiphos_ , is named _Anaklusmos_ , or Riptide in English, is Percy's weapon of choice. Its dormant form is a fountain pen, in which will always return to Percy's pants pocket if he ever loses it, which is fortunate, because he still loses school supplies all the time. It was originally owned by the Oceanid nymph Pleione, and was passed down to the Hesperides Zoe Nightshade, and eventually wound up in Percy's hands. It was a weapon that had many past users, and had particularly high affinity with wielders with some connections to the rivers and seas.

Chiron took hold of the blade, and took a second to admire it. "This could use some more cleaning," remarked Chiron. Ok, maybe not to admire it, but to examine it. The centaur touched the tip of the blade to his palm, and made a small slit. The blade drew _ichor_ , the golden blood of the gods.

Percy gasped when Chiron cut himself, but didn't move to do stop what Chiron is doing. Chiron has been teaching heroes for millennia, so he should know what he is doing.

Chiron put the sword on his desk, and from a drawer took out a long bandage. He then started wrapping his wound. For a moment, neither person in the room spoke.

"You didn't answer my question, Percy Jackson," remarked Chiron as he finished bandaging his hand.

"I don't know," said Percy. It really was odd. There were probably tons of legacies living in the mortal world, but just like Chiron said, only the ones that went to demigod camps actually get injured by Celestial Bronze and Imperial Gold. Rachel previously never got hurt by Celestial Bronze, but since hosting the spirit of the Oracle of Delphi, the campers, especially Percy, who witnessed the effectiveness of Celestial Gold on mortals firsthand, were shocked to realize that Rachel could be harmed by Celestial Bronze. Egyptian Magicians have no divine blood, but could still be hurt be them. It's almost as if...

"Maybe because only those involved in the supernatural world can be harmed?"

Chiron smiled. "Good guess Percy, but not quite. Let me give you you a brief history lesson.

Ancient Greece and Rome was a very different time than it is now. The Mist wasn't nearly as powerful as you may think. In fact, many mortals in Ancient Greece can somewhat see through the barrier passively, and can see through it completely simply by concentrating. The Mist only became powerful some time after the fall of the Western Roman Empire.

In the days of Ancient Greece and Rome, Celestial Bronze and Imperial Gold weapons were considered to be the best of the best, and often only a king or a very wealthy nobleman can afford to give their highest ranking officers and most skilled warriors these weapons. But why would a weapon that cannot kill, or even injure most of the population even be used at all? Wouldn't specially enchanted weapons do the same job, but actually harm their opponents?

The answer is, Percy, that Celestial Bronze and Imperial Gold were able to harm and kill mortals in the Ancient Times. The weapons were so good, that no ordinary metal could stop them. They stabbed their way through shields, slashed apart swords. Very few weapons that weren't made of those metals could block them, much less defeat them."

When Chiron let that shoe drop, it took a while before Percy regained his senses.

"If Celestial Bronze and Imperial Gold could harm mortals back then, why not now?" asked Percy.

Chiron trotted back toward his desk, and picked up Riptide again, examining the edge of the blade. "This is a frequently discussed by experts in New Rome and Circe's Island you know. Some argue it is because of the rise of Christianity after Constantine. Others argue that it is due to the Roman Empire falling. Others still look to records of when the weapons first started failing on mortals. I believe the latest research show that the metals only began failing around the year 519, a good two decades after the fall of Rome, but no indication of why the metals stopped working has been found. However, I think it is something different."

Chiron started fingering the tip of the sword he was holding again, but made no moves to harm himself. "When I gave you this sword, I told you the blade would not harm mortals, simply because they are not important enough for the blade to kill. Now tell me, do you consider a person's life important?"

Percy blinked. What was Chiron asking? "Of course," Percy replied without hesitation. "All life is important."

Chiron hummed in response, and said, "If there were only 200 people alive, would one person's life be more important than if there were 7 billion alive? Are all lives equally important? Are your friend's lives more important than yours? Can you honestly say that your life is just as important as your father's?"

Thunder boomed in the background, but Chiron simply muttered an apology, and awaited Percy's answer.

Percy's throat went dry. How should he respond to that? His fatal flaw is the inability of letting go of his friends, but that could also be translated as [he would risk his life to protect his friend's from harm]. Does that mean that he considers his own life to be lesser than his friends? are his friend's lives worth more than others? Percy didn't answer the question, and just stood there.

Chiron continued his speech, "The answer is simply **no**. All lives are not all equally important. And the proof is this blade." Chiron held up the sword again, and gestured to Percy to take it back. When he did, he continued, "My theory is that these blade literally judge whether or not if the your target is worthy of being hurt by it. Remember how a demigod's scent becomes more powerful once they know of the supernatural? The same applies to demigods and mortals. If a legacy never discovers that gods and monsters exist, then they will not be harmed from our weapons simply because they aren't important enough. Same with mortals. Those that become magicians can be harmed by Celestial Bronze." Chiron shifted his gaze back to Percy. "Do you understand the implications of that, Percy?"

"Umm..." Percy thought hard, back to what the conversation was about. "That means that Miyu isn't considered important enough to kill?"

Chiron nodded, "Not _currently_. She was probably something in her life, but for better or for worse, she is now human. So do you know why I am telling you all of this?"

"To watch and take care of her," replied Percy. It made logical sense, to keep something you are interested in close to you.

"Correct," said Chiron. "Now go pack now."

As Percy was leaving, Chiron suddenly remembered something that he forgot to tell Percy. "One more thing, Percy,"

Percy turned around to listen to Chiron's last message, "A department store in Boston got blown up two nights ago. Be careful."

Percy took note, and went to pack his belongings to return to his mother's apartment.

* * *

The driver the next morning surprised Percy.

Normally, it was always his mother that came to pick him up after camp is over, but today it was a different driver waiting for the the demigod and the little girl.

"Hello guys!" said Percy's stepdad Paul Blofis as he waved at them, leaning on his Toyota Prius.

Paul married his mother roughly two years ago, and the relationship between the demigod and his stepdad was good. In fact, despite being an English teacher at his high school, Percy's second most hated subject, just behind Algebra, Percy actually found himself enjoying his lessons. He knew Percy was a demigod, and he took the revelation fine. He even accepted the hellhound in the living room and the hoof-prints on his Prius' roof then laughed it off, when Percy's previous stepfather would've tried to use them as excuses to get Percy sent to juvenile hall.

However, Miyu didn't know that.

Seeing the unfamiliar man, and not the warm, loving mother she knew, she hid behind Percy, and stuck her head out and cautiously watched the man.

Percy gestured to his stepfather, looked to Miyu, and said, "This is my stepfather, Paul Blosfis. He is an English teacher at my high school, so if you need any help with the language, you can go to him. He's a really great guy."

Paul chuckled, stepped forward, stretched out his hand towards Miyu, and said with a smile, "So you're Miyu, huh? I heard about you from Sally and Percy, but I was at a conference at the time so I wasn't able to meet you. It's nice to meet you, Miyu."

Miyu didn't move a muscle from behind Percy's back.

Paul looked a bit distressed. "Oh, do you not know any English? I totally forgot that Sally said that you didn't understand it. I'm so-"

"It's not that," cut in Miyu, earning a very surprised look from Paul and a small chuckle from Percy from the look on his stepdad's face, "It's just that I'm no good with people. Sorry about that."

Paul made a look at Percy, as if betrayed, "I thought you guys said she didn't know English."

Percy shrugged. "She learned the language ridiculously fast. I think she knew a bit of English from somewhere, and then just studied really hard here at camp. She was able to hold simple conversations after about a week."

Paul looked at Miyu, as if incredibly impressed. "Wow, here I was thinking I had the honor of teaching a student English from scratch. And here you are, already knowing the language." He looked at Percy, "Now, if only you had her work ethic."

Percy looked affronted. "Hey, it's not my fault, I'm dyslexic! I also spent a term asleep for six months."

Paul shot him a look. "Whatever you say, Percy. Get in the car."

Unlike the last car ride where Miyu spent the entire time staring out the window while the other people in the car talked, this time Miyu only occasionally looked outside, and instead was transfixed by the pop music on the radio station, now that she could understand it.

"So Miyu," said Paul. "I hear you came from Japan. What's it like to live there?"

Miyu took a second to think about her response. "Well, it was very quiet where I lived, and I didn't really have any friends."

"Is that so?" said Paul.

There were a few more conversations, but they were usually about what Miyu did at camp and how far did Percy come to studying, which wasn't much.

"So," said Paul, after a discussion about what major Percy might want to take, "Did you guys make any New Year's Resolutions?"

Percy thought for a moment. They didn't really have those at Camp Half-Blood, especially since most demigods, especially the more powerful ones, don't survive into adulthood. There were exceptions, both individually and in several generations, but those were exceptions, not the rule. So Percy rather not think of resolutions that he might not be able to keep. However, ever since the peace between Camp Jupiter and Camp Half-Blood, for the first time in his life, Perseus Jackson had a chance for a future.

Unlike the Greeks, who traditionally went solo with the occasional quest or expedition, Romans demigods usually always did everything as a group. The Greeks usually had demigods trying to eek out a living in the mortal world the best they can, but the Romans built their own society to protect themselves and raised generations of families. Percy wanted that future. When he first landed at Camp Jupiter without his memory, that was one of the hopes he latched on to: being able to live a happy with Annabeth.

The couple planned to go to college there after graduating high school, and then live a full life, but in order to do that...

"My resolution is to work hard to catch up and to improve in school," said Percy. Percy was never an incredibly diligent student, partly because he never thought he might really need it, since ever since he was a demigod, he thought he would die by the age of 16. Since then, things had been looking up, but it was difficult to break old habits. Now was a good time if any to just that.

Paul nodded in approval. "Very nice, Percy. I look forward to reading your essay on _Hamlet_ on the second day we get back then. Printed and typed."

Percy groaned, "Do I really have to type it out, Paul? You now how I am with computers." It was an embarrassing fact at school. Due to the fact that using a phone or the Internet was essentially firing a signal flare pointing out your location and saying _"I'm here! Please eat me!"_ for demigods, Percy avoided using them as much as possible. However, the habit made him inexperienced with using a computer keyboard versus just writing it by hand. It certainly didn't help when the letters and numerals would swim off the keyboard, inhibiting typing of any kind. It also made him out to be a technophobia at school.

Paul grinned, "Just because you cannot use wireless communication safely like making a phone call or using the internet doesn't mean you can't type it up while my laptop's on airplane mode. It is a way of life, Percy. I doubt the college at New Rome is completely void of technology and the Internet."

Percy begrudgingly acknowledged his point, and then turned to Miyu, "What is your New Year's Resolution?"

Miyu promptly delivered her response, "I want to make the most of my life."

Percy didn't know what to think of that. Neither did Paul, and that comment killed off any conversation for the majority of the car ride.

* * *

The moment Percy walked into the apartment his family lives in, he saw his mother on the phone, with a very serious expression on her face.

She was very harshly talking to the person on the phone, "-I don't know who you are, but you are to never come anywhere to my-"

Sally noticed the three familiar figures walking in the door, and paused for a second, then waving at them and offering a quick smile before she continued to chew out the poor fellow on the phone. "-For the last time, don't call this number ever again, and stay away!"

After that final word, Sally hung up and had a relieved expression on her face. "Hello guys, sorry you had to see that."

Percy nodded. His mother was fiercely protective of her friends and family, so while unusual, her behavior was reasonable.

Sally put up a smile, "Well, how was camp for you guys? Did you have a lot of fun?"

"Well, I spent most of it catching up on material I missed last year. I'm still behind, but I'm getting close," said Percy.

Sally clapped her hands together, "That's wonderful. And you, Miyu?"

Miyu looked and the woman for a moment, and smiled. She then said while bowing, "It was very fun Mrs. Blofis. It was a very wonderful experience. Furthermore, I would like to thank you for your hospitality"

Sally was shocked for a moment before recovering, "Did you play a prank on us by pretending not to know English?"

Paul chuckled, "No, as unbelievable as it seems, Miyu apparently learned how to speak the language by the time I picked her up."

"Really? Well, that is very admirable, Miyu," Sally said. She turned to her son. "You see, Percy? You have to work hard like that."

"Mom!" yelled the 17 year-old teenager. Sally and Paul just chuckled.

"Why don't you show Miyu around the house, Percy?" asked Paul. "You should find her new bedroom during the tour. Sally and I are going to go out to manage the store."

"I thought it is still the holidays," said Percy.

Paul laughed. "Maybe for you and Miyu, but I still need to prepare stuff for school tomorrow, while your mother's store is opening again today at eleven. It will be just you two for a while. You guys can even go out and explore the city if you want to."

And like that, the couple left the building.

Percy then turned to Miyu, who decided to sit on a couch reading a book on the coffee table. He never even noticed the oriental girl move. For a moment, neither of them spoke.

"Well?" asked Percy, breaking the awkward silence, "Which room would you like to see first?"

* * *

It turned out Miyu wanted to see everything.

It was surprising, since the girl always seemed to be meek and shy. However, Percy discovered that it wasn't the case. Miyu just seemed disinterested in the world. She didn't interact with you because she couldn't build up the courage to, but because she didn't see a need to. If she needed something, she would ask in the most blunt way possible.

The tour of the house was short. They lived in an average sized apartment, so there weren't many rooms. There was a kitchen and a living, but they were small. There are three bedrooms, in which one was empty. The last bedroom was hastily converted into a room fit for sleeping. The last time Percy saw it, it was just a room for the family to put stuff in. Now it had a dresser, a desk, a lamp on said desk, a chair, and a plain white bed. There was also a note on the door saying that they could go shopping if Miyu had any preferences later in the week.

"Well, what do you want to do now?" asked Percy, with the tour now finished.

Miyu just shrugged, and went to the couch to pick up the book she was reading earlier. It was a book on Greek Myths that Annabeth gifted him years ago to know what monsters to look out for.

"You can at least respond, you know?" said Percy, feeling a little frustrated by Miyu's aloofness. He started to turn around to leave, but a voice cuts through his thoughts.

"Thanks for the tour."

Percy looked over his shoulder. Miyu was still reading the book she held, the book opened to a page depicting a beautiful marble statue of a female. Besides the turning of the pages, nothing indicated that Miyu said anything. Percy shrugged and went back to his room to finish up his _Hamlet_ essay.

He already had the essay written down-he spent hours with Annabeth going over every single detail of it. Now he just had to type it up. Ever since his mother disposed of his late stepfather, Smelly Gabe, the family found that much more funds than it had before. After his mom married Paul and finished her first completed series of novels, the larger family again found they had a fair surplus of money. Apparently, while Percy was gone for six months, Paul and his mom decided to purchase three new computers- a laptop for Paul and his work at the school district, a desktop for Sally and her literature, and finally a laptop for Percy that was sitting on his desk waiting for him until the day he returned.

Percy always found that part incredibly touching. His mom and stepdad were so confident that he was going to return that they bought him it even after waiting for so long. With that thought in mind, Percy began starting the process of converting his essay from paper to Microsoft Word docs.

It took him a fair bit of trouble typing, especially since Percy was told to avoid most electronic devices that uses any kind of wavelengths besides the radio. Because of that, he had limited exposure to using a computer. Before, Percy has always argued that he couldn't type it because of his dyslexia being particularly bad when it came to keyboards, but Paul brought the hammer down after he returned for his senior year at Goode.

Percy did improve bit by bit, and half an hour in, roughly half of his essay was typed up. He was just about to start a paragraph on how he could relate to _Hamlet_ when-

*knock *knock *knock

That was strange. The morning newspaper should've came in already, and Paul and his mom never entertained guests at the apartment before. Percy briefly wondered who it was, before jumping out of his seat. It could be a monster!

He hurried to the hall, only to find that Miyu already opened the door. Without looking at whoever knocked, Percy immediately uncapped Riptide and swung it at the intruder...

...And barely beheaded Carter Kane who barely jumped out of the way fast enough.

Silence. Nobody moved a muscle, with Percy's blade tip almost touching the magician's neck.

One second passed.

Two seconds passed.

Carter sighed, still at sword-point. "Do you mind?"

* * *

 **And that's a wrap! It is only logical that Percy would think that whoever knocked on the door is probably a monster. After the Titanomachy and Gigantomachy there are still hordes of monster roaming the world. If Percy first meets Hestia thinking she is probably some monster, he must be really overly cautious.**

 **Now, onto Percy's character. I honestly tried to keep him as in character as possible, but we all know how hard that is to do...except it seems that no one really puts a lot of effort in keeping him in character.**

 **Anyway, I put his resolution as working hard because of what his future aspirations in life looked like by the end of HoO. Ever since the age of 13 or so, Percy has been fighting for his life year after year, every time not knowing if his next battle will be his last.**

 **In the Riordanverse, it is revealed that most Greek Heroes die young, which is frequently brought up, even with Theseus and Achilles. Greek Demigods will try to settle down in the mortal world, but except in exceptionally rare situations and the dawn of WWII (I still refuse to believe all the child of Hades were on the Axis' side. The battle lines can't be so one-sided like that. Yeah, you can argue that the Japanese and Germans performed genocide, but the Germans and the Japanese got their country burned to the ground by the Allies, and got two atom bombs dropped on them. In addition, the _Kamikaze_ , though a symbol of death, means _divine wind_ , which honestly put them in more alignment with Zeus than Hades. I find it extremely more likely that instead of children of Hades, it was the children and messengers of Japanese Pantheon, in particular Amaterasu, who fought to expand their domains), demigods will typically die young.**

 **However for Percy, when he discovered New Rome and the civilian population there, he now suddenly has a clear future ahead of him. Instead of living in hiding always fearing the next year will be his last from all the monsters, he now has something to look forward to, and that's why I chose his New Year's Resolution to be that.**

 **Before any of you guys rage at me about canon and the "Trials of Apollo," I will reiterate: I'm not considering that canon as part of this story, as writing a fanfiction with a growing canon can experience major contradictions the more canon expands. For example, the PJO fanfic "Broken Bow" now contradicts canon, though when it was written it didn't.**

 **Since there is no mess with Nero (or whoever was the villain in THO, I didn't read it and I didn't care about it so much after reading the plot), it is Python stopping all messages from the future. In this fanfic, the demigods responded to this by deciding to fund a major expedition, one even bigger than the one to Alaska. Because let's be honest, as much as I love the Seven, there's no way only a handful of demigods** **can take Delphi by themselves .The only reason the Seven were able to get all the way to Athens was because the Giants deliberately let them. Any other route for the demigods was blatantly suicidal to the point that they were forced to play right into the Giants' hands. Delphi would likely be the most heavily guarded location by Gaea's forces, especially since it is one of the only places with a reliable way to see the future, but the temple contains an artifact that is a symbol of Greek and Roman power, so naturally it is heavily guarded.**

 **So heavily guarded in fact, it is probably comparable to the defenses of Mount Othrys and more, which took the entire might of Camp Jupiter to bring down.**

 **The expedition in this story will probably never be fully fleshed out in this fanfiction, but I might return to it in a different story. Plus, it was kind of unsatisfying when a big plot point of the series, the Greek and Roman forces uniting to face down Gaea, never really happens, unless you count the final battle at the end, which is less of a battle and more of a desperate fight to survive for the Greeks and Romans. Plus, one reason I actually preferred the TLO over most of the books in the HoO series is because characters that aren't the main characters actually do something. But that is my opinion, if you have your own, please share or keep it to yourself, just don't rage.**

 **Now back to the Class cards, because no one can seem to agree on them.**

 **Yes, in this story, all the Class cards have some kind of will. The entire reason for using the Kaleidosticks was to use as a median so the Heroic Spirit's personality doesn't affect the judgement of the wielder. Yes, the Gilgamesh card is capable of outright possession, but in this story, even minor class cards can influence the wielder's decision making. There is a reason that when Miyu installed the Gilgamesh card, Sapphire got slapped away. As a median between the card and the wielder, it simply couldn't suppress the card.**

 **Daedalus and his reincarnation. Right, I made that point a bit misleading, sorry. What I meant to say is that his reincarnation is top notch, and is up there with Roa and his bodies perhaps on par with Touko's. It isn't Heaven's Feel, not even close, and I never tried to connect his reincarnations with Heaven's Feel.**

 **Celestial Bronze and Imperial Gold's properties are explained too, as well as why Miyu isn't harmed by them. Seriously though, Celestial Bronze and Imperial Gold never got much of a backstory.**

 **It might take a while before the next update, since I plan on re-hauling chapter 1 for typos. As always, please review, and favorite and follow if you like this story.**


	6. Chapter 6

Miyu observed the visitor as he sat on the dark blue chair in the living and drank the water his host had given him. He was African American, wore a dark coat and pants, and looks perhaps a year or two younger than Percy. Miyu didn't recall ever seeing him at Camp Half-Blood, but that didn't mean much: many demigods only attended during the summer, when monsters no longer had to go through the trouble of sneaking into a school to attack a demigod.

However, the teenager in the room with Percy and Miyu wasn't a demigod. Miyu couldn't exactly place how she knew, but he just wasn't. He was something different, but much more terrifying to the young girl. However, she did recognize him as a mage instantly. All mages were able to sense prana around them, usually manifesting as one of the five main senses. Miyu and her brother had little to no training as mages, but they knew the basics of prana manipulation, and right now, she could literally see the prana rolling off the teen. He was a mage all right, a strong one at that.

Mages, in her home world, were traditionally scholars, wise-man who searched for the secrets of the universe. In practice, they were ruthless individuals who will go to any measures to achieve their ultimate goal, to reach the Root. No atrocity was too great for them as long as their research bore fruit. The only deterrent stopping countless massacres of the ignorant populace were the Executors of The Holy Church and the Clocktower's Enforcers punishing any individual that threatend the secrecy of the Moonlit World to the natural one. However, even then atrocities still occur- they just have to be held in secrecy from the mundane population. All in the pursuit of the Root. In fact, most of the city she lived in died as collateral damage because of _her_.

Why? Miyu was something any _proper_ mage would happily kill all of their family and friends for. In fact, she was kidnapped by two different groups of magi hoping to use her for her power. Even if the magic users of this particular dimension seemed a lot more laid back than the ones from her's, based of her observations of the Hecate cabin, she couldn't help but feel wary

Percy on the other hand seemed perfectly comfortable with the stranger. If anything, he was desperately apologetic for almost cutting off his friend's head. The other boy sitting in the room seemed bemused, despite almost having his head cut off a moment before.

The mysterious teen broke the silence. "Who's she?" he asked, gesturing at Miyu.

Percy glanced at Miyu, and grimaced. "Well, this is a problem. Miyu, Carter and I have to discuss something, so why don't you go in your room and-"

"He's a mage, isn't he?" said Miyu, cutting off Percy.

Both Percy and the teen looked at her in alarm. "How did you know Carter is a mage?" asked Percy with suspicion. Carter also had his guard up.

Miyu blinked. It seems that the knowledge that Carter was a mage was a secret of some kind. Maybe she wasn't supposed to know that he was a mage? Yes, judging from their reactions, perhaps.

"I knew someone who a mage," said Miyu. "I learned how to detect magical energy from him." That was true. Her adoptive father and brother were mages, but they didn't teach her. She learned about it from some of the books on magecraft they kept around. Her brother knew that she was reading them, but allowed her to read them.

Pause.

Carter shrugged. "I guess it's fine if she already knows about the existence of magic. Also," Carter turned to Miyu, 'For future reference, we call ourselves magicians. The term 'mage' works, I guess, but we don't call ourselves that. What's your name, and why are you with Percy here?"

In another world, the word [Magician] would imply a different meaning to Miyu. A word that spoke of all-powerful beings able to push the boundaries of magic to their limits. Near immortal beings that every mage strives to be. But in this world, the word [Magician] meant little. In an age where most teenagers without the right mindset to learn magic can perform high ranking mysteries in only a few months of training in a world where the Age of Man never started, the term [Magician] had little special meaning beyond just being a person who can use magic.

"Hello, I'm Miyu Emiya," Miyu politely introduced herself. "I got stranded here due to a series of events, so I'm staying with Percy until the foreseeable future."

"It's nice to meet you, Miyu," Carter equally politely responded. "My name is Carter Kane. I am an Egyptian magician. We generally try to keep our existences a secret from each other, and we would keep it a secret from you too, but since you found me out on sight, I don't think we can keep it a secret from you for long. Just try to be discreet about this, ok?"

Miyu nodded, but kept her guard up. Usually nothing good came from trusting a magus unless if it is under a geas contract according to her adopted family, but Carter seemed to be trustworthy.

Percy cleared his throat. "So why are you here, Carter?"

"I need to talk to you about something, so I tried calling you, but every time I tried dialing the number you gave me, but when someone picks up and I mention your name, the person on the other end goes ballistic, so I decided to come and get you myself."

Percy looked sheepish, "Sorry about that. My mother is really protective of me at times. I'll tell her later that it was just you. So what did you want to talk to me about?"

Carter face turned serious. "Well, you see, we fought something a few days ago. At first, it seemed to be just a rogue magician, but it was...different. Unlike the usual magician, rogue god, or monster, this one was just that strong. Have you ever faced something that seems simple at first, but was just completely out of your league?"

Percy nodded, and Carter continued, "Well, this one wasn't as powerful as your typical doomsday bad guy, but we were just completely helpless." Carter shuddered, as if playing out unpleasant memories. "Have you ever fought a meaningless battle that you just couldn't win? It was like that."

Percy looked a bit troubled, "Well, I fought a few opponents like that, but they were hopeless in different ways, like immortality in just being outmatched in combat, but you will have to more specific for me to understand."

Carter sighed, "Well, it was really unbelievable, I don't think I would've believed it myself. You see, we were investigating an incident involving a department store being destroyed..."

Miyu noted that Percy instantly sat up straighter and paid more attention to Carter's story.

"But on the way there, we were intercepted by a woman riding a chariot. The chariot was really fancy, but what caught our attention were the creatures pulling it. They were the first sign what we were fighting wasn't...normal. The chariot was pulled by two large dragons that shone like like second suns in the sky."

Percy looked even more alarmed by the description of the chariot and the dragons.

Miyu and Percy listened to the rest of Carter's story. He talked about how easily the dragons and chariot were dispatched, but the real challenge was the enemy magician. How they were absolutely helpless against the beams of light. How Anubis himself had a hard time beating the monster mage. How Walt might as well be dead from the fight. How Sadie's connection to Isis was severed.

"Amos, Zia, and several experts arrived yesterday," Carter continued. "You know how her magic was different, not quite Greek, Roman, or Egyptian, but sounding like Egyptian, but had Greek symbols? Well, after the researchers grilled us about every last detail, they discussed with themselves for a while, and, well, they found something."

"What is it?" asked Percy. Miyu also found herself absorbed in the magician's story.

"Well, I've never even heard of it before yesterday, but the researchers are speculating that it is something called High Speed Divine Words. Does it ring any bells?"

Percy shook his head, having never heard the term, but Miyu nodded.

Carter turned to Miyu again, "You know about it?"

Miyu fidgeted nervously, "Um, I've read about it in a book back home. I have never seen it used before though."

Of course she hadn't. High Speed Divine Words were extinct in her own dimension, only ever utilized by ancient magi who were taught by the gods themselves. They were different from regular magecraft by how they function, and was ranked higher than virtually all magecraft, even mimicking True Magic. It didn't surprise Miyu that it existed in a world where the Age of Gods never ended.

Carter grimaced, "That's how it was for us too. It's theoretical, and speculated to be magic lost after the fall of Egypt, among various other kinds. The sources we have on it are incredibly old and limited, and only include vague details on how it works. Thoth, the god of knowledge on our side, has been incredibly quiet about the subject. Whenever we try to contact him about it, he refuses to deny or confirm its existence."

"So what does it do?" asked Percy.

"Well, do you know how a spell works, Percy?" asked Carter.

Percy's face drew up a blank, and Miyu answered in his place, "It is the artificial application of a Mystery of Miracle."

Percy looked at Miyu in surprised, but Carter took it all in stride, "Well, I suppose you can call it that. Magic is essentially casting our own will onto the real world's. The world, despite all the monsters running around, wants to stay mundane. Magic is all about forcing your will onto reality's, and temporarily overcoming it. Does that make sense?"

This time, it looked like Percy understood what Carter was saying. "So what is different about High Speed Divine Words?"

"Everything.

According to some ancient texts, High Speed Divine Words is different from regular magic due to how it operates. Instead of projecting magical energy into a spell, merely speaking the words will compel the [World], whatever that means, to do all the work for you. In other words, it costs almost nothing to use, as long as you know the words."

Percy looked troubled, "Well, that is scary. So what are these words? I know names literally have power, but I don't think I've ever cast a spell before by saying names or speaking Ancient Greek."

Carter said, "Well, it isn't spoken in Greek or Egyptian. The funny thing is, it is spoken in the language of the gods."

Percy blinked, "But I thought the all important language is Ancient Greek and Egyptian."

Carter sighed, and said, "Well, I thought that too. I would still think that if I didn't hear the magician speak. She was clearly Greek, her spells had Greek symbols on them, but it clearly sounded like Egyptian. Apparently High Speed Divine Words is a language onto itself, and she wouldn't tell us anything about it."

"Wait a minute, who's this she? The magician?"

"Yeah, she." responded Carter sheepishly. "Sorry, I forgot about that. We captured the magician that was causing us all this trouble. She absolutely refused to say anything at all, even her name. In fact, she does little moving at all. She had these with her." Carter reached into his pocket and brought out two things: a golden necklace with two crossed torches and a odd looking tarot card of a generic wizard on it with the words [Caster] written on it.

Wait, Caster?

CASTER?

 **CASTER?**

Miyu instantly froze upon seeing the Caster class-card, but the two teenagers didn't notice.

What was that doing here? How did it even come here? Her brother wished for her to come here, not those as well! Miyu instantly began thinking of logical reasons why the class-card was here in this universe as well.

Meanwhile, the two boys continued their conversation. "Caster?" Percy read, a little confused. "The two crossed torches is obviously Hecate, but what's this?"

Carter shrugged, "We don't know. None of the scholars knew anything about it. The term [Caster] is so vague, that it is impossible to research. We suspect that this card has something to do with souls. I was hoping you might know something about this."

Percy looked at Carter, "How old did you say this magician you were fighting is?"

Carter blinked, "Well, she didn't say anything, but maybe she was in her 30s I guess."

"Well that's a problem. The oldest confirmed child of Hecate is 15, Alabaza, I think. Maybe she's one of Circe's followers."

Carter tilted his head, "Circe? Like the Circe from the Odyssey?" It attracted Miyu's attention too. Why wouldn't it? Circe was one of her favorite characters in so called Greek mythology.

Percy nodded. "Yeah, she trains an entire island of woman on how to use magic. She might be related to Hecate, but I'm not sure. Since they practice magic, they might carry around the symbol of Hecate with them.

Carter considered the idea, "Maybe... So what about the card, Percy?"

Percy shook his head, "I might not be an expert in Greek mythology, but I've definitely never heard of a legend regarding cards of any kind."

Carter sighed, "Well, that leaves one last option then." He stood to get up.

"What is it?" asked Percy.

Carter said, "You coming to Brooklyn House to see the prisoner of course. When are you available?"

* * *

Carter knelt on the ground in front of the warehouse Brooklyn House stood on, hurling his lunch onto the pavement. "We are never doing that again."

Percy paid the sick teenager no attention, instead redirecting it towards the massive Hellhound barking in delight as Percy petted it.

Miyu also came along, as Percy was reluctant to have Miyu by herself in the apartment until his parents came back.

Miyu herself found the journey via shadow travel a novel experience, but wasn't too disturbed by it. Traveling across universes was worse.

Percy turned around and whistled after Mrs. O'Leary shadow traveled away, "So this is Brooklyn House, huh?"

The eight story warehouse it stood on wasn't particularly impressive besides its enormous size, being seemingly abandoned, but what on top of it was certainly very impressive, though not as big as the Ainsworth's palace/mansion. The actual mansion itself was five stories tall and made of limestone. The walls had Egyptian Hieroglyphics on them. How they kept the walls so clean and safe from erosion, Miyu didn't know but dismissed as magic.

After Carter controlled his stomach, he led them over to a set of stairs going up the side of the warehouse. The three climbed up the stairs, and came to a large wooden block with no handles or switches of any kind.

Carter raised his hand up to it, and without touching the wood, slid his hand up. The "door," if you can call the wood that, slid up and disappeared in to the ceiling.

Percy looked surprised, " _Whoa_ , how does that even work. Can you teach me that?" Miyu personally found the entrance a little mundane for a mansion for magi. The Ainsworth had layers of bounded field preventing anyone from entering their mansion, and that same bounded field can choose who can come in or out. The wood didn't really compare to the Ainsworth's. But then again, as Miyu entered the mansion, she noted the bounded fields protecting the mansion. Perhaps she judged too soon.

"This is the Great Room," said Carter, gesturing at the room Miyu and Percy stepped into. Miyu's senses, both mundane and magical, were then bombarded by information.

It deserved that name. The Great Room was four stories tall, with balconies on every floor it occupied. Stone columns riddled with Hieroglyphics held the ceiling up, and odd instruments and Ancient Egyptian weapons hung on the walls. There were many doors leading out of the room, and many people, both old and young buzzed around. A large flat-screen television sat above an enormous fireplace, which was big enough to fit Miyu's new bedroom in, and large leather sofas were sat on either side, which many teenagers crashed on. The snakeskin? rug on the floor was larger than any snake Miyu knew of. Large glass windows prominently displayed the swimming pool out back as well as the dining area, both of which were full of teenagers enjoying their last day of winter break. And in the middle of it all, was a 30-foot tall black statue of a man with the head of an exotic bird holding a scroll and an ancient variation of whatever the Egyptians used as writing utensils.

It was incredibly lively, reminiscent of what Miyu saw at Camp Half-Blood. It was nothing like the life Miyu has lead until she arrived. Oddly, though she wanted that kind of life, she felt a bit apprehensive at actually socializing with them.

"Miyu," Carter said, "Percy and I are going to talk to the prisoner. Meanwhile, you can stay around here, ok?" That was fine by her. She doesn't want to meet the woman who was possessed by the class-card. In fact, she doesn't want to acknowledge the class-cards at all.

The two teens then disappeared upstairs, presumably to visit the prisoner.

Not knowing what to do, Miyu just stood in the Great Hall, not interacting with anyone, just staring.

She didn't know how long she stood there, but it certainly felt like forever. She felt...out of place. The young teens sitting on the couch watching television just seemed to be completely different from her. How should she start a conversation? Would they think that she was weird. What should she-

"Hey." A soft voice from behind her interrupted Miyu's inner monologue. Miyu turned around to face the sound.

It came from a girl perhaps a year older than Miyu. She had skin that was slightly darker than Percy's (Arabian perhaps?), and stood taller than Miyu. She was dressed like a normal teenager, and held a scroll in her hands. She also wore a small smile.

"Who're you? I know most of the residents in this Nome, but I don't know you. Which Nome are you from?" The smile felt a little contagious to Miyu, prompting her to respond. However, Miyu felt no signs of magic influences, so she can only presume that it was just the girl's natural charisma.

"Um, my name is Miyu. I'm just here with my...friend," responded Miyu. That seemed to be the best way to describe Percy. What else could she possibly call him? "What's a 'Nome'?"

The other girl frowned. "So you don't know what's a Nome, huh?" The other girl's eyes flashed, and suddenly, Miyu had a headache. It became hard to think. Where was she? Why is she here? What was going- Oh. _Oh_. Miyu quickly started circulating her body's own prana, her od. Anything possessing prana rejects foreign prana, so mages can usually dispel minor thaumaturgal effects and sometimes resist entire spells applied on them. Now Miyu was no mage, but she possesses impressive od reserves, and knew the theory behind it.

A moment later, Miyu found herself facing the girl she just met before. The girl was panicking slightly, as expected of someone who just attacked somebody who just resisted their memory manipulation magecraft.

"I'm so sorry," the girl said apologetically. "I just thought you were suspicious you know, not knowing what a Nome is, and we were told to do that to anyone suspicious, and-"

"It's ok," said Miyu. "A boy named Carter came to his apartment to tell him something, and they ended up coming here. I tagged along."

"Wait, Carter, invited you guys? Now I feel even worse." The girl slumped over, looking depressed. "Well," she said smiling after standing back up, "My name is Emily. Nice to meet you, Miyu."

"Nice to meet you too, Emily." This was the longest conversation she has had with a girl her age besides Erika Ainsworth, but Erika was never really a friend, despite what she thought. She was like a prison guard almost, but the girl didn't know it. "You know Carter?"

Emily blinked, and than chuckled, "I guess if you don't know what's a Nome, you wouldn't know who Carter Kane is, either."

Miyu tilted her head. Was Carter that well known? But he looked only 16! Was he the son of some important person? The boy didn't seem too different from a regular person, albeit being a mage. Who was Carter Kane?

Emily read the unspoken question, and hastened to answer it, "He's the Pharaoh of Egypt, and the most powerful combat magician in the House of Life."

...That seemed like a very impressive title. Miyu had only read about the power of magi in the Age of the Gods. They were apparently more akin to forces of nature in battle rather than magi of the day, back in her universe. For him to be the best combat magician...he must be very powerful. She didn't really know what being the Pharaoh of Egypt meant though.

"So, really, what were you doing?" asked Emily.

Miyu hesitated, and then spoke. "Well, nothing really. I don't know what to do."

Emily laughed, "Yeah, I got that too during my first week here. Would you like to come to the library with me?"

"Sure." Miyu's favorite pastime was reading. After all, if there's anything her family had in spades, it was books. In fact, they probably had enough to fill a small library.

But the library downstairs absolutely dwarfed theirs. The library took up three stories , and the ceilings, floors, and walls were painted with various depictions of people, gods and monsters. The library had no bookshelves whatsoever. Instead, they had honeycomb shaped structures built into the wall to hold scrolls. However, they was a a few bookshelves on the third story of the library, probably to hold the Egyptians' newer texts. How the library somehow was under the mansion despite being located on top of an abandoned factory Miyu attributed to a bounded field. If the Ainsworth were able to hide their castle, then so could magi from the Age of the Gods.

"Impressed?" smirked Emily, as she guided Miyu down the steps.

There were several tables on the ground floor of the library, where Miyu observed several young apprentices taking notes from scrolls that looked centuries old. Some scholars were standing around an ancient statue of what Miyu thought to be some kind of deity. A baboon, which should have no place in a library, Miyu thought, was helping another girl, perhaps 15 or so, organize scrolls in their assigned places.

As the two neared the ground floor, the girl with the baboon noticed them, "Hello Emily, what are you doing here today?"

Emily said, "I had a day off from training today, so I decided to come to do some reading. I met Miyu," she gestured at the aforementioned girl, "who was visiting, and decided to invite her."

The other girl smiled, "It's nice to see that you are making new friends here. Have a nice day." The girl turned back to the baboon, "Now Khufu, bring these scrolls to 10-6,"

"ARGH!"

As the baboon and the girl went back to their task, Miyu turned to Emily expectantly, "Khufu?"

Emily laughed, "He's our pet baboon. Very intelligent. He will only eat food that ends with -o, and for that reason he attached to Cleo the moment she got here."

Miyu nodded. It was very odd, but she didn't judge.

Emily brought her over to another set of stairs, this time leading up to the bookshelves on the third floor. "If you find any interesting books, feel free to take a look."

So Miyu took a look at the books. They weren't as varied as the library back at her home, but it was certain that she had never read them before. They were on a variety of subjects, including but not limited to: _A Brief History of Egypt_ , _Finding your God_ , _Magical Lineages and Why They Matter_ , and _A Beginner's Guide to_ _Hieroglyphics_. Some of the books were as thick as textbooks, while others were no longer than 50 pages long. Miyu had trouble picking a book, and ended picking _An Introductory to Magi_ c by Jean-François Champollion, the person who Miyu recognized as the one who decoded the Rosetta Stone. What? Who wouldn't take the opportunity to learn magic if they could? She knew the theory, but was never taught, so she thought she might as well start, if only for self-defense.

She found Emily at another bookshelf, holding three very thick books and a scroll about Egyptian Gods. "Did you find something you wanted?" she asked. "Oh, that book? It's a great choice if you want to start learning, though you might not be able to. You might want to actually read through that before trying anything in it. When you feel ready to try something, we can go into a practice room. Just don't test them out on the spot, ok?"

Miyu nodded, and soon found herself reading at a table on the bottom floor with Emily.

While Emily dug into a record of historical encounters with the gods, Miyu started reading the book she picked:

 _For starters, we need to discuss "What is Magic?"_

 _Is it something fantastical, or is it nonsense? The truth is somehow both mystical and mundane._

 _Magic is the art of using magical energy and turning it into something usable, like a spell, simple as that. This is the truth of all Magic taught by the House of Life. There might be other magical systems out there that is different, but they are lost or forbidden._

 _Before discussing how to perform a spell, again, one needs to learn about magical energy._

 _So what is magical energy? The answer to that is still contested. It's source is still speculated. Some claim that it originates from Duat. Others claim it is just the way it is. In my travels to reconcile my own perceived reality after learning the existence of the gods, I concluded that this magical energy originates from two sources: the planet itself, and the soul._

Miyu's breath hitched upon reading that, but pressed on.

 _So what do I mean by that? Well, the magicians at the First Nome teaches that a magician casts spells using their own personal storage of magical energy. _This personal storage of magic varies by individual. The mages of older bloodlines, in particular the_ Blood of the Pharaohs _like Alex Kane, will be born with more storage than other magicians. Magical energy in one's body is generated by the individual, though the rate of generation of this magical energy also varies from individual to individual. This rate of generation often varies directly with the magical capacity of the individual._ This capacity will never change, no matter how much an individual ages, trains, or otherwise. One can only learn to use this energy more efficiently. If you exert yourself too much, you life force will be paid when you run out of this energy, so always be cautious of that._

 _Because this, many magicians find ways to store magical energy should they ever come in danger in running out. This will be covered later in the book._

 _The next kind of magical energy I observed comes from the Earth. Now, I'm still not completely sure why this is so. My best guess is that the planet is somehow alive, but I came to this conclusion upon observing that this magical energy cannot be from the earth god Geb and the energy from the Duat, while vast, simply doesn't interact with the magical energy in the world. While I was traveling the world, I also observed areas where magical energy literally poured out of the earth. These locations are called_ ley lines _by the local demons that usually prowl these locations. These special locations are very rare outside of Egypt and the Middle East. In fact, many important locations are located above them, such as the First Nome of the House of Life and the Great Pyramid. There might be many more of these in the world, but there is some kind of interference from finding more._

 _The amount of magical energy in the air is vast, usually much more than the magical energy in one's body. However, beyond certain types of magical artifacts, amulets, and wards, it is still currently unknown how to use this vast supply of energy. Perhaps the ancients knew, but that knowledge is mostly lost._

 _Now that you have learned the basics of magical energy, go to chapter 1 on energy manipulation._

The book was incredibly informative, being apparently written by an outsider learning magic. Therefore, Miyu was quickly able to grasp all the concepts explained. The book went on to describe how to channel magical energy from one's od, the name she was taught of an individual's personal prana, and then on basic spells, like writing simple hieroglyphics and scrying. After a while, a certain technique gained her attention.

"What's this?" asked Miyu, interrupting Emily, who was reading about how the gods participated in defending Egypt from foreign invaders.

Emily leaned forward, looking at the page Miyu stopped at, and frowned. "Huh, that's a pretty advanced technique. I haven't really grasped this either."

"Oh, should I start with something a bit simpler?"

"No, it's fine, if you really want to start with this one. Rumor has it that Carter got it right on his first try, so it's not impossible for a beginner...Let's try it," said Emily. She started to put away her books.

"Um, aren't you going to finish them?" asked Miyu. She certainly couldn't stand only reading half a book, as it left her incapable of thinking of anything else but the book.

Emily chuckled, and said, "I already read half of these, and the other half don't seem very interesting. Let's go. Don't worry about my books, the library _shabti_ ," she gestured at the clay statues in the library, "will put them away. Take your book along. We'll tell Cleo we're borrowing the book for now."

Miyu nodded, and picked up her book, clutching it to her chest. She and Emily left their table and started walking to the stairs. While en route to their destination, they found Cleo having an animated conversation with another girl with dyed blond hair, maybe a few years older than Miyu.

"I told you for the last time, Sadie. These are all the books we have on hosting gods and the dangers of drawing too much power," said an exasperated Cleo.

"No way, there must be something, something in this library that can tell us what happened to Walt," said the girl, presumably Sadie.

Now that Miyu took a closer look, she noticed that Sadie didn't look very well. Her eyes were red and had bags under them. She looked completely exhausted, as if she hadn't slept for quite a while.

Cleo then took notice of Miyu and Emily, the former very confused about what's going on with the latter having nothing but sympathy for her instructor. "I'm sorry, could you wait a moment, please?" Cleo then turned back to her friend, "Sadie, I'm sorry. We just don't have the information. Almost all details about hosting gods have been lost since Rome. We know literally nothing about them besides our own experiences."

Sadie opened her mouth to retort, when she was interrupted, "Maybe he processed too much power?"

Both Cleo and Sadie turned to the speaker. Miyu blushed. She couldn't help but blurt out that piece of information.

Sadie glared at the newcomer to the conversation, "Who are you?"

Miyu hesitated, and looked at the other faces of the magicians. Only Emily's nod of encouragement prompted her to speak. "I'm Miyu Emiya. I'm here with a friend."

Sadie squinted, "Who's this 'friend'?"

Emily looked like she wanted to speak up to defend her new friend, but Miyu beat her to it. "Percy Jackson."

Emily looked confused at the name, but both Cleo and Sadie looked shocked for a moment before regaining their composure.

"Percy Jackson," said Sadie slowly. Miyu's answer didn't seem to calm her down, but made her more irritated.

Miyu could only nod to that.

* * *

Miyu had to leave the book with a _shabti_ at the library. Apparently, being an acquaintance of the demigod warranted protection and secrecy. In other words, Emily was left behind at the library while Sadie marched Miyu up the stairs.

Miyu vaguely understood why she was doing this. On the way to the mansion, Percy and Carter impressed upon her the importance of the secrecy between the two mythologies. In short, a few months back, the ghost of an evil mage named Setne attempted to fuse the two mythologies to grant upon himself the powers of a deity. The would-be usurper of divine might is now apparently an ornament on Carter's desk.

Miyu personally still didn't get how ghosts worked though. As far as she could tell, ghosts were the souls of the dead. However, in her home world, souls cannot survive without a body, and even with one, will begin to rot over time. From there on, souls will return to the Root, be cleansed, and then recycled. The only exception to these rules she knew of were of Heroic and Divine Spirits, but in her modern world both were unable to affect reality.

The novelty of a deceased individual with no physical body being capable of casting spells and challenging gods was shocking to Miyu. There was no doubt that any such individual in her own world would be given a Sealing Designation and ruthlessly hunted down, if possible. Any magi from the Age of the Gods were capable of magecraft beyond virtually all magi of the present day, so what was to say that the Church or the Clocktower would be able to track down such an individual?

As Miyu was in a monologue to herself, she didn't realize that Sadie already brought her over to the doorway to the Library. Sadie then walked her over to a set of stairways leading to the next floor.

The second floor was essentially one large chamber, with several smaller rooms serving as...closets maybe? Miyu never really been to many buildings before, so what lay behind the few other doors were up to her imagination. The single large chamber had several teenagers, both male and female playing a game of...basketball? Basketball, or at least it looked like it. Miyu noticed through her magical senses that several members were using spells. Nothing noticeable, but subtle spells. Miyu couldn't identify any specific spells she found in the book she read, but at least one player was jumping abnormally high.

Sadie ignored the game and pressed on to the next floor.

This next one seemed to be more of a residential area. There were dozens of rooms, each so large that Miyu knew for certain that the mansion wouldn't have been able to fit them all. As always, she attributed to the building's bounded field. Or maybe it was the Duat. The concept of the Duat confused Miyu. It was hard to describe. On one hand, it was layers of reality under the mortal world. On the other hand, it seemed to be some kind of alternate dimension that was in directly parallel to this one. The book mentioned that some Egyptian buildings had entrances in the mortal world, but in reality were stuck half into the Duat. That allowed the insides of the buildings to be significantly larger than the exterior.

Sadie dragged Miyu through the third floor, passing a room full of preteens watching a movie on an enormous television. Miyu stalled a bit next to that room, catching a glimpse of a man in a full red and blue jumpsuit with large white patches where the eyes would be flying through the city on what seemed to be a grappling mechanism that could be shot by his arms. Miyu hadn't watched any real movies before. Her brother never had any movies to watch, and the TV in the Big House, that Chiron made her swear not to tell any of the campers, only ran athletic and nature programs. Mostly athletic ones, most of which Miyu had little to no interest in. As a result, Miyu was instantly attracted to the spectacle. Sadly, Sadie dragged Miyu past that room before she could see much else of the movie.

The older girl led her technical guest into a different wing of rooms, a section where there were no more dorms. The hallways in the new section lacked the Egyptian paintings and patterns of the rest of the floor. Eventually, Sadie walked up to a door and opened it.

The room inside was nothing compared to the rest of the dorm rooms. Like the corridor in which its doorway its in, it lacked any kind of decoration. The single bed in the room was simple and plain white. A single window to the outside world as small, around the size of a 90 square centimeter square. There were three inhabitants in the room. The first two were familiar, Carter and Percy. The last one wasn't.

It was a beautiful woman either in her late 20s or early 30s. Her hair color was...odd. Hair as black of night flowed down her shoulders, but several portions of her hair were off color, a bright indigo, contrasting with the rest of her hair. Her eyes were off. One of them was as black as night, while the other was a bright indigo, the same color as some of her hair. Her face was grimacing, as if she found something extremely unpleasant. Perhaps she found the security measures uncomfortable. Bands of various colors were wrapped around her, binding her to the bed, and Miyu noted their power, even though she had never seen them before. Various Egyptian symbols orbited the figure, none of which Miyu was able to identify.

Percy and Carter turned to the newcomers. "Hello Sadie," said Carter pleasantly. He nervously glanced at Miyu and said, "I see that you've met Miyu."

Sadie's gaze hardened, into a glare. "I have," she spoke calmly.

A moment passed before Sadie went ballistic, "ARE YOU TWO OUT OF YOUR MINDS? WE AGREED TO KEEP ALL THIS A SECRET, AND THEN YOU-"

"She knew I was a mage the moment she saw me," interrupted Carter.

Sadie still looked vexed, "So? Why is she here?"

Percy laughed sheepishly, "Well, she's staying with me for now. My parents were out, and well, I was told to keep my eyes on her at all times. Because she identified Carter as a mage in an instant, we didn't see any harm bringing her along."

Sadie slumped, the fight completely escaping her, "Fine then. Any luck getting her to talk?"

Carter shook his head. "No, she still isn't saying a word, though now we think it's because of some kind of interference preventing her to say anything."

Miyu tilted her head. "What interference?"

Carter shrugged, "We don't know. At first I thought it was because of something to do with demigods being counted as something. This mansion is intolerant about letting gods enter without permission. However, demigods and hosts of gods aren't effected. However, we brought Annabeth here before, and she never experienced any discomfort in this mansion, and didn't require any permission to enter, so we are now at a loss." Carter nodded to Percy, "Percy came in here just fine as well, so being a demigod can't be the reason."

Miyu accepted the answer, and said, "So who is she?" pointing to the women.

This time it was Percy who answered, "We think she's Medea."

"Medea?" muttered Sadie, "Didn't she die like a bajillion years ago or something? So shouldn't she be dead then?"

Percy cringed, "Well, yeah. But you know how we said that during the war with Gaea, she raised a bunch of souls back from the dead? Medea was one of them. We never managed to confirm whether or not she was still alive after the war."

"Oh," said Sadie.

Miyu rubbed her head, thought, and said, "Maybe it's because she has no mortal blood?"

Everyone in the room stared at her. "What do you mean?" asked Percy. Miyu knew that though Percy was a Greek demigod, myths were never his strong point.

"Medea in legend was the daughter of Idyia and Aeëtes. Idyia was the daughter of the Titan Oceanus and Titaness Tethys. Aeëtes in turn was the son of the sun god Helios and Oceanid Perseis. Due to this, Medea would in turn have no mortal blood, despite being mortal herself. Maybe the mansion let her in because she is mortal, and not a god, but still restricts her because she has 100% divine heritage."

"Huh, so she isn't a daughter of Hecate?" muttered Percy.

Carter looked impressed by the girl's knowledge, but a little confused, "But wouldn't two divine beings have another one as an offspring? Or at least be immortal? I don't understand how the children of gods work, heck," he gestured to Percy, "I don't _want_ to understand how it works." Percy himself looked a little green at that statement. Miyu then remembered how a camper once mentioned that all the winged horses in camp were related to Percy. Well, maybe he didn't want to understand it either.

Miyu shrugged at the question. "Divine Spirits don't work like that."

Everyone in the room blinked at the unfamiliar term. "What do you mean by that, Miyu?" asked Sadie.

Miyu was uncomfortable at the question, but at Percy's encouraging gaze continued. "Well," started Miyu, "How did gods come to be anyway?"

"Hmmm," Carter rubbed his chin. "That's a very good question. I've never really thought about it after learning that the Egyptian gods existed. But since the Greek and Roman gods also exists..." He turned to Percy.

Percy shrugged, "Same as you. I think Chiron mentioned that they are nature personified or something. Apollo told me that the Sun is both a giant ball of gas millions of miles away, and his car for somehow. I just try not to think about it."

Sadie on the other hand wasn't in any mood to discuss a complicated philosophical question, "So what? Why does that matter? They're there, that's what matters, right?"

Carter shook his head, "Actually, not quite. Both Greek and Egyptian mythologies have their own creation myths that aren't compatible with each other. For both of them to exist...it would require that both interpretations of creation are correct, that both are wrong, or one of them is incorrect. We," he gestured to Sadie, "personally witnessed the Sea of Chaos and the first landmass of Order and Creation, so that confirms the Egyptian's relevance." He looks at Percy, "What about you guys?"

Percy nods. "Annabeth and I fell into Tartarus once. There-"

"Wait, WHAT?" exclaimed Carter.

Sadie looked confused, "So? What's this Tar Tar 'kus?"

Carter looked at Sadie, as if he were a professor lecturing a small child, "Well, Tartarus is basically the inescapable prison for the Greeks. A Pit that they throw all their worst criminals and enemies into." Carter looked back at Percy, wide-eyed, "How in Ma'at did you survive _that_?"

Percy shivered, and suddenly looked around fifty years older than his actual age. His eyes looked haunted as he recalled the damned hellhole. "Let's not talk about it."

The other people in the room noticed how sensitive the topic was for the demigod, and dropped the subject.

Percy continued, "Well, we encountered this primordial goddess named Nyx. She was so old and powerful that if she so wanted to, she could probably be defeat anyone in the Greek Pantheon. Gods, Titans, Giants, even Gaea and Tartarus themselves stand no chance against her if she so chooses. And she says that her realm rose from the realm of Chaos or something. Perhaps our mythologies are connected in that way?"

Carter shook his head, "Although they share a common name of "Chaos," what "Chaos" is different between the two religions. I'm afraid that there are few connections between our two religions."

Sadie shrugged and turned to Miyu, "So, how are gods formed?"

Miyu fidgeted a little before answering, "Faith."

Percy frowned, "Faith? But people don't believe in the gods anymore."

Carter thought for a moment. "Actually, that actually makes sense, if we take the common interpretation of why ancient civilizations have gods."

Sadie looked confused, "Don't the Ancients worship the gods for power or because the gods order it."

Carter waved his hand, dismissing the idea, "No, I mean how mortals perceive gods.

It is a generally accepted fact that mankind first started developing the idea of gods as reasons for why certain stuff happen. Why does the sun move across the sky? Because someone is driving it across the sky. Why does lightning strike? Divine judgement.

However, after the Ancients developed the ideas for these deities, they needed backstories. No being in history doesn't have some kind of history. So they had stories of how each god came to be.

So in this model, the gods are brought to life behind the worship of humans. Any backstory, or history they have is not because of their actual history, but because that is the history the ancient civilizations assigned them."

"Woah, that's pretty deep," said Percy. "I don't think the gods appreciate us thinking of them only as figments of human imagination."

"But it makes sense," cut in Sadie. "If the gods are like this, that means children of gods after they already formed from creation don't become gods as well. Instead, they are mortals or monsters. Plus, it would explain why cycles of myths always happen. Because the gods have certain stories of them, and since those myths are a part of them, they will repeat the same actions over and over again."

"But what about Tartarus? The Duat?" asked Percy.

Sadie said, "Well the theory isn't-"

"Hypothesis."

Sadie glared at Carter.

"A theory is the highest level of scientific fact, ok? Not-"

"Alright, alright, we get it, stupid brother." Wait, Sadie and Carter were brothers? Miyu didn't know that. But then Miyu and her brother looked nothing alike, so what right did she have to judge?

"The _hypothesis_ isn't perfect," continued Sadie, "but it makes a lot of sense." She then looked pale. "And that means that there are other gods out there."

The entire room was quiet for a while under the new revelation.

"Well," Carter said nervously, as if worried to trigger some disaster, "We were a bit off topic. Let's get back on track." He turned to face the sorceress bound by the ribbons to the bed and spoke clearly, "I give Medea permission to enter Brooklyn House!"

There was no bright flash of light. No wave of energy or anything that resembled similar situations from what Miyu had read from the shounen manga her brother sometimes bought. Instead, the sorceress just started coughing.

The teenagers moved around her, unsure what to do before the woman stopped coughing, and spoke, "Damned Egyptians."

Taking the initiative, Carter decided to start, "Hello, I'm Carter, are you Medea?"

The witch was unable to turn her head, but her voice was enough to show her disdain, "Why yes. I was able to hear everything when I was unable to move or speak. Why do you ask?"

Carter looked to Percy, who took his turn. "So Medea, did you destroy the Lowe's Department store in Brooklyn?"

"So you are the hero who saved Olympus?"

Percy nodded.

"Yes, I am," responded Medea.

"Why did you do it?"

Medea was quiet for a second. And then she spoke, in a spoke quietly, without any hostility, "If you were to meet yourself in the world, what would you do?"

Percy blinked at the seemingly nonsensical answer, but continued forward "Can you swear to the River Styx that you will not try and run away from us, kill us, or lie to us until we say so if we release you from these bindings?"

Medea closed her eyes, "I could escape now and reduce you all to ashes if I so wished to right now. I could cast a compulsion on all of you right now, and order you to kill yourselves If I wanted to. But I will not. I have no intention to face death, which will be an inevitability if I were to stick around you guys. I will answer your questions truthfully, but I will not swear."

Carter looked nervously at his companions, who were equally unnerved. He reached into his pocket and brought out the Caster class-card to Medea, "So what is this?"

Medea's eyes glanced at the seemingly harmless tarot card, or at least to all but Miyu and Medea, and said, "I cannot divine the card's true nature and form of manufacture, but I gained some new knowledge after being possessed by it. I can tell you that there are seven of them total, and you have just collected one of them. There are six more, and almost all of them are stronger than the one you are holding right now. There is...a soul of some kind inside. An amazingly powerful soul. It is possible to...form a temporary contract with it to gain that soul's power."

Carter looked at the card with a new light, "Is there a way to destroy this card?"

This time, Medea laughed. A laughter close to being delirious. After she calmed down, she spoke with disdain, "Look at me, _Great_ Pharaoh."

Carter obliged, and stared at the mismatched eyes of the sorceress that nearly took his life. "I'm the absolute pinnacle of a mage any magic user could ever hope to achieve. I've learned the language of the gods, survived through two Gigantomachys, was able to cure Heracles' madness, a curse imbued by Hera herself, and evaded death after my patron's defeat. You by yourself cannot even possibly stand up to me. If I can't fathom a way to destroy it, can you?"

Sadie's eyebrows furrowed, "We'll find a way."

"Do you mean your vaunted shadow-binding method? I'm afraid that won't work," sneered Medea.

Carter looked shocked. "How do you know about it," he demanded.

Miyu didn't know what the magi were talking about, but it sounded incredibly important.

Medea scoffed. "Do you really believe that your mythology had the most advanced magical society? If not for the return to the so called 'Path of the Gods,' your 'House' would be nothing but a third rate organization. It's still nothing but second rate, and nothing compared to the ours, the Holy Church's, or to the Chinese. Your House of Life fell into disrepair millennia ever since your House of Life refused to cooperate with Cleopatra, even though she succeeded in becoming the Eye of Isis. I hear your organization still denies it to this day, blaming the gods and Cleopatra, though the blame is all theirs.

As for why it will not work? Think about it. You already concluded that the history of the gods are mutually exclusive to each mythology. Naturally, that same rule applies to most unique techniques of certain mythologies. Egyptians swearing on the River of Styx will do nothing, and the five part soul only exists in Egyptian controlled domains. These cards don't count."

Carter and Sadie looked at each other uncomfortably, while Percy and Miyu felt awkward at the new pieces of information.

"Just give us information," half pleaded Miyu.

At Miyu's voice, Medea's scornful expression fell, to be replaced by a look of confusion, and then resolve.

"ἀνακλώθω"

Miyu blinked at the usage of Ancient Greek, while the rest of the occupants in the room seemingly grabbed their weapons in a split second. Miyu only registered why too late.

The rainbow colored ribbons instantly undid themselves and the Egyptian Hieroglyphs shattered. All the specialized defenses the Egyptians set up were penetrated so quickly no one had time to react. The raw magical energy that was suddenly released disoriented Miyu for a second.

"ἀντεπιχειρέω"

When Miyu regained her senses, she found the ancient witch bringing herself to the same level as her, holding her in place and staring at her with mismatched eyes. Behind them, a giant magical array spun behind her, filled with symbols. The teenagers were reluctant to attack, clearly the display of magic rattled them.

The witch kept staring, and Miyu had a sudden recollection of someone telling her that the eyes were the window to the soul. Before she can pull away, the witch released her, fell to her knees, and started laughing.

The laughter was unnerving to all other occupants in the room. It was laced with far more emotion than her previous laugh, and this time she seemed to be laughing at some absurd subject.

When she finally stopped laughing, Medea looked at all the occupants in the room with new interest, especially at the young oriental girl on the ground now shivering.

"I see how it is," Medea spoke while staring at Miyu. "I agree on your terms, I will swear on the River of Styx. Just give the card to the girl."

Carter, who still had the card in his hands, looked at Medea with distrust and caution. "Why should I?"

Medea smiled. It was not a pleasant smile, but a very odd and complex one. A smile that somehow showed both pity and amusement. "Because she needs it the most."

* * *

Ever since the incident a year ago, Dr. Howard Claymore's life had changed.

It didn't change as in he found true love or anything, for he had little interest in that. No, he had his world view expanded.

He was a philosopher, not on social-political ideas, not on human nature, but on the ideas of birth and death.

When was something considered living? When is something considered dead? Where does one's consciousness first develop? Where did it come from? What happens to it when one dies? Those were all ideas that fascinated him.

He even made that his way of living, and though he was young at the age of 24, he was considered the next Stephen Hawkins in that regard. He sold millions of books, and thought he found an answer to everything.

Until one day, a fifteen year old shattered his view of the world.

Howard never believed in fate, not even now with the revelations that prophecies existed, but if there was anything in the world that was fated, to him it would be that encounter.

That boy was Alabaster C. Torrington.

You see, Al, as he now calls him, was a demigod. In fact, he was the most powerful child of Hecate, the goddess of magic, born in centuries. After fighting for a cause that he believed was right, the gods had slain his comrades and banished him.

Al came to him for aid, though Howard was 100% mortal, and therefore of limited help, because he was being pursued by an undying sorceress after him.

After a chase, a plan that was quite honestly somewhat stupidly simple, and dying (something that he can't recommend), the two allies managed to defeat the sorceress, who turned out to be an ancient witch named Lamia.

Although his body was technically dead, Hecate made a body out of the Mist, or a mistform, to house his soul. To keep himself "alive," he now requires Al to sustain him, something the demigod didn't mind, as Howard was in a way his savior.

The two developed a fast friendship, and Howard soon adopted Al as his legal guardian.

Since then, the two have been seeing the world.

It was a decision made by both of them together. Al knew that his own life probably wouldn't last very long, as most demigods died by the age of 16, and wanted to make the most of life while he was at it. On the other hand, Howard recently had his eyes opened to the nature of the world, and wanted to see the world with new eyes.

Their first destination? Tokyo.

There was no clear reason for why they chose Japan first. Maybe because the two wanted a break from European culture. Perhaps it was to simply eat the cuisine. For whatever reason, it was the first place on their list.

And it was an eyeopening experience. It soon became clear after arriving in Japan that their view in the world was still too shortsighted.

First of all, the magic in the air was plain different. It began to contaminate Howard's Mistform body until Alabaster noticed and halted the contamination.

But the second and most obvious clue were the spirits in the air. There were hundreds in the airport they were in alone. The city had thousands. And they weren't Greek or Roman spirits either. They were far to corporeal, in which Greek and Roman ones had little influence on the physical world. Furthermore, they came in all different shapes and varieties. Some were humanoid, while others were hideous abominations. Others were animals, who skipped between legs or flew in the air.

It was not until they arrived at a major shrine before they got an answer.

A priest apparently saw them, and remarked how it was rare to get visitors.

Apparently the Shinto were very involved with the mortal world, especially to the mortals worshiping them, a rarity in the modern period. As a result, though the amount of population who admit to be Shinto was low, the percentage of practitioners were higher than virtually all other non-Abrahamic religions. As a result, the number of people able to interact with the spiritual were incredibly high.

This absolutely fascinated Alabaster and Howard. Up until then, they assumed that the Greek and Roman gods were the only ones in the world, an assumption that now seemed hubristic. When Alabaster commented about neither of them knowing other pantheons existed, the priest suggested they travel to China next. Apparently the two pantheons had a relationship that was closely intertwined with each other.

From then on, it was off to the races. The pair studied the effects of clashes between pantheons in China, the epics of India, and even encountered an organization called the Holy Church dedicated to the Abrahamic God in Jerusalem. Apparently every single one of them were real.

Howard and Al learned many new things. For Al, it was the new magical spells and theories they came across. He was especially interested in "Thaumaturgy", a style revolving around innate "Circuits" carved into a human soul.

To their surprise, it wasn't Al who had more affinity with the style, but Howard.

Apparently being descended from the gods don't grant you circuits of more quality or quantity.

For Howard, it was always about expanding his world view. In the past year, the world he always viewed as finite and limited was now impossibly large, and he wanted to explore it all. He even set about writing his new book, but instead about writing on the subject of death, which he was proven tragically incorrect by the mythological world, he instead wrote about how different individuals had different perceptions of the world.

It was a major success, but the next step in their journey was when the two world travelers attended a seminar to his book in London.

The woman appeared young, but Howard and Alabaster felt no small amount of nervousness when she walked up to them to ask a question.

She had unnerving red eyes, with a beautiful face that had little emotion if any at all. Dark purple hair cascaded down to her hips, and everything about her posture screamed "majesty." However, the most prominent aspect about her was the feeling of being analyzed and cut up while in her presence.

She asked one question a question so familiar, but so different, a question which changed their world again.

"How would an undying being die?"

* * *

 **AN: And that's it.**

 **It actually took me a while to write this chapter, as I'm a little unsure of where to go from here. I got a storyboard with a general list of events and ideas, I just need to connect them together now. I also went back and edited my first chapter, if only to get rid of grammatical errors.**

 **As for which words Medea used, she said the HSDW for "undo" and "counterattack."**

 **As always, please review. It really shows support, and I will try to answer any questions you guys may have.**

 **My upload speed will most likely be higher from here on out, see you guys soon!**


	7. Chapter 7

**January 3rd**

Medea smiled. She had no interest in this area before, beyond it being the home of the gods, but that has all changed. There was something new here. New and exciting. Exciting and powerful. _The girl_. What was her name again? Oh yes, Miyu.

The girl was certainly worth being subservient to the House of Life. Since making her oath, she was allowed to wander the mansion, as long as she stayed within the walls. It was fascinating.

The 21st Nome was certainly different from Circe's Island. Make no mistake, Circe definitely had a smaller magic organization than the House of Life, but it was by no means small: Circe had around 200 followers on her island, with some 800 more scattered around the world. Their goal? To advance magic. To develop it. To become powerful with it. To fulfill their wishes with it. That was their path for millennia. After all, most thrive to learn magic for those exact reasons.

The House of Life however, was a completely different beast. They were originally the priests of the Egyptian gods. They worshiped them, sacrificed for them, learned from them, all to further their own civilization. But then something happened. Something they couldn't fight. Someone they couldn't beat with their magic. Alexander the Great.

Alexander by no means abolished the House of Life, but he did something unforgivable to the Magicians. He brought over his own culture. The Greek gods once had a close relationship with the Egyptians, then they reigned supreme. And after Alexander's fall, Egypt didn't wound up back under dynastic rule as the House hoped, but was conquered again by Alexander's general, Ptolemy. The great conqueror's body was then buried deep in Egypt, symbolizing the Greek roots in Egypt forever.

Under the Ptolemaic dynasty, Egypt flourished. Greece fell. Rome rose to power. Egypt ignored the new nation state, and kept to itself. Only once Rome defeated Carthage and became the dominant power in the Mediterranean did the kingdom pay attention. But its citizens, the native Egyptians, only reluctantly listened to the Greek Pharaohs who tried to appease them. The House of Life did nothing to support the Pharaoh.

And then she appeared. Bright, beautiful, intelligent, powerful, she was everything every female sorceress tried to be. Cleopatra. Intensely loyal to her kingdom, she raised Egypt to new heights. Unlike her modern reputation and depiction, she was far more than a beautiful face. She won the hearts of Rome and Caesar, delaying the inevitable invasion. She secured trade deals and wealth for her country. She studied magic, to attempt to earn support from the House of Life. She did everything she could, but even she could only do so much.

Even when Rome attacked, she attempted to stall at every opportunity. She dived deeper in her study of magic and the gods, to divine a way to save her country. She finally did it. She contracted with Isis, and successfully became the Eye of the goddess. However, the House of Life still did nothing. They would rather see their Greek Pharaoh die horribly than lift a finger to help, figuring they could seize control after Cleopatra died.

They were wrong.

Cleopatra was powerful, but even she had limits. She fell in battle, and that was when the House of Life realized their grave error. The Romans were terribly efficient at quieting any rebellions. They burned scriptures of powerful magic, effectively rendering the organization helpless against their conquerors. The Egyptian gods fell to the sidelines, still worshiped, but diminished in importance. The House of Life went into hiding.

They wouldn't resurface until the fall of the Roman Empire. The magicians, so ashamed of their history and poor judgement, decided to blame everything. The old leaders, who failed to assist Cleopatra. The Romans, who stole away their artifacts and obelisks, but most importantly, the gods. They worshiped them for millennia, yet in their worshipers' most desperate times, they failed to answer. All but two gods deliberately ignored the conflict.

The two gods and the Chief Lector, the most powerful magician in the House of Life, met, and came to a decision. The gods must be sent away. Even the gods, so ashamed in their kin's betrayal and neglect agreed. They taught the magic to fight, defeat, and seal the gods.

Thoth, the god of knowledge was one of them. He was always the ally of not only the House of Life, but the Pharaoh. When Alexander came, he served him as an aide. He faithfully served the hated Greek rulers. He tutored Cleopatra in the Path of the Gods, despite her lineage not having any connections with them at all. Since the House's betrayal to the rightful pharoah, he has since distanced himself from them, but could not ignore the wrongdoings of his fellow deities.

The other one was Isis. She remained in prominence even in Roman occupation. If anything, her power and worship increased and surpassed her worship in Egypt. She became so important that a temple on Delos, the birthplace of the twin archer deities, was built and dedicated to her. She was the mother of all Egyptians. The friend of slaves, artisans, sinners, but also the friendly ear to maidens, the wealthy, and merchants. She supported every Pharaoh, which she always viewed as her child. Even the Ptolemaic rulers, she supported, though she was hostile to them at the beginning. And then came Cleopatra, a Pharaoh that she personally adored above all others. For the gods, her family, to abandon their duties to the Pharaoh and Egypt, as well as to Cleopatra, was a sin she couldn't forgive.

So the Egyptians, with their new god sealing teachings, ventured out to fight the gods. They weren't always alone. They sometimes hired Vikings, Byzantine warriors, foreign mages, and others to help them in their quest.

In the end, they were successful. Hundreds of gods were sealed. Whoever wasn't sealed retreated deep into the Duat or counterattacked violently. Battles had large death tolls, but the warriors and magicians pressed on. Finally, there were four left to be sealed.

Osiris, Horus, Nephthys, Set. They were incredibly important deities, powerful enough to avoid capture and left a path covered in blood. Thankfully, Nephthys, a long time ally to the House of Life, agreed to stand down and assist Isis. The battle between the five deities, all brothers and sisters, was fierce. Whatever foreign allies the House of Life had were brought in to quell the fighting. The Franks, the Norse, the Celts, the Welsh, the Byzantines, the Christians.

In the end, the two sister deities defeated their three brothers. However, upon being defeated, the god must be immediately sealed in an object, preferably a powerful artifact.

But the three brother gods were too powerful to be contained for very long. So the two sisters did the unthinkable: they sealed themselves with their brothers, to ensure that the five would never be released again.

So the battle was won, but it was difficult to call it a victory. Thousands died facing the assault, Egyptian and foreigner alike. Many of their allies, observing the huge human cost in fight the gods, elected to distance themselves from them. The House of Life itself never recovered from the loss of human life.

So from then the House of Life started its millennia long task of imprisoning the gods. They had no other reason in life, no other purpose. And so they did just that for centuries.

But then came the scattering of Egyptian artifacts, many of whom had gods entrapped in them.

The House of Life was forced to expand, for every artifact had to be accounted for. There were 5000 fully trained Egyptian magicians scattered around the planet, all dedicated to their one purpose in life.

But then a year ago, the Kane siblings rose to prominence, and spat in the face of traditions. Perhaps they were right: the Chaos serpent Apophis did rise, and it certainly threatened the planet. No other pantheon would assist them, due to their previous experience of tremendous loss to human life. Pantheons across the planet were shocked to the news that these two upstart magicians actually not only defeated Apophis, but forever destroyed his essence, preventing the serpent from ever arising again.

But that victory threw the House in confusion. There were now thousands of displaced magicians, skilled in combating the gods, who had their reason to fight expelled, then fought in a pointless civil war, and were then told to smile and acknowledge the path of the gods.

Naturally, that caused plenty of unrest.

It took Medea a long time to think about her decision, though it sounded deceptively simple.

After all, though the House of Life was primitive and behind the times compared to other organizations, they did have a fairly large amount of well trained and knowledgeable individuals, perhaps one of the largest in the world. Most importantly, one of their base of operations was close to a point of interest.

So she cast the spell on the large bowl of oil in front of her, and the oil on the surface shimmered.

At that exact moment in time, a mirror on a tropical island rippled, and the one doing her make-up before it blinked her eyes in confusion before calming down.

"Oh, it's you. Got captured by the Olympians and taken under questioning? And why are your eyes off color? You dyed your hair as well? What happened?" asked the woman in the oil.

She was beautiful, no doubt about it. She wore the black dress proudly over her body, with long braided black hair running down to her back. Golden silk ran through her hair. Images seemed to flash through her dress and hair, but non were distinguishable. Piercing green eyes stared out of the oil, as if examining a particularly interesting specimen.

"Close, but not quite, aunt Circe," answered Medea easily, waving a strand of indigo hair out of her face. "I found something interesting here."

And Medea told her aunt her findings.

The immortal witch's irises flashed upon Medea's quick summary. "Tell me more."

* * *

 **January 7th**

Miyu sat on her bed, trembling.

It was the last day of her first week of school. It was different than any school she read about. First of all, there were no uniforms. While that may be normal for any American school, virtually all Japanese ones had them, so it was a slight culture shock for her.

Second of all, she suddenly had to deal with children her age.

It was...difficult to adjust at first. Miyu had many fears about school. What if no one liked her? What if someone started dastardly rumors about her? Would she be discriminated based on her ethnicity? How should she answer questions about her family.

Those fears were dashed quickly. Every in the class were friendly, almost overly so. Everyone made sure to be polite to her, and several approached her after class to trade phone numbers.

That was another point of nervousness for Miyu, who had no phone, but the girls laughed it off, and invited her to sit with them during brunch.

They asked her a lot of questions about her life, and she answered to them. They allowed Miyu to ask questions in turn, and their responses both confused and intrigued her.

She never would've imagined the blond girl who invited her out to eat with them had a Representative to the House as a father, or that the 7th grade brunette that was her friend enjoyed playing baseball.

It turned out to be fairly easy to make friends at her school.

By the last period of Tuesday, Miyu had a list of names to memorize, along with a plenty of faces. Edward. Richard. Ryan. Adam. Cynthia. Emma. Kimberly. Audrey. Marie. Katrina. The list went on and on. Luckily she was good at memorizing names. A perk from her hobby of reading.

That said, the school library was enormous. Not as large as the one in Brooklyn House, or as informative as the one in her old home, but it was far more diverse. And it included a genre she had never witnessed before: fiction.

Sure there were reading assignments that her brother had, but they always seemed to be more academic than true fiction. But here, there were just so many new books to discover. Sci-fi, fantasy, realistic, historical, she didn't care, she wanted to read them all.

The homework at her new middle school wasn't difficult either. They were all on subjects she had already previously read about. Even the test they were given Miyu scored a perfect hundred with extra credit with ease. According to her newfound friends, she would've been tagged as a nerd if she didn't spend so much time socializing and doing so good in PE class. In fact, the PE teacher actually had a private conversation with her encouraging her to join a sport the next year.

Speaking of friends, Miyu still had frequent contact with Emily. Emily somehow was able to smuggle an amulet to her, one that would allow for communication between them. Even better, it also had the capability to serve as a portal. Emily came via portal on Wednesday, and the two friends spent the afternoon reading and fooling around, but weren't allowed to go outside because Sally apparently didn't think it was safe for the two of them to venture out without adult supervision.

With Emily's help, Miyu also got the Duat storage technique to work for her. It was difficult, but Miyu was now able to use it after a few tries. It seemed simple: imagine a storage device in the Duat. Give it a lock, combination, fingerprint scanner, etc, and then give yourself the imaginary key. Or it seemed simple in ley man's terms. It actually took hours of practice for Miyu to get it right. At least now she would never have to carry around her stuff anymore, something that Percy envied.

In fact, Percy begged Miyu to teach him the technique, but it turned out that Percy had little to no magical aptitude.

The family she was staying at treated her well.

Sally Jackson-Blofis in particular took a large amount of delight in dressing the new resident in all sorts of clothing she bought. Miyu tried to block out those moments out of her mind, and was thankful that if she simply didn't resist, it would all be over shortly afterwards. She was beyond nice: she walked Miyu home from school, she baked extraordinarily delicious cookies for everyone in the family, and was generally a warm presence to everyone around her.

Percy now treated her as a family member, in contrast with the slight suspicion at first when she correctly identified Carter as a mage. He even offered to help her with homework, before realizing that Miyu was scoring perfects in all her classes, even English. Upon the discovery of how much she actually knew, he even slightly exploited her to help him on his own homework. Off course, Miyu would never actually do those assignments for Percy, but rather help him in a style quite similar to being a tutor. Nevertheless, Percy was grateful for her help in his assignments. Apparently he missed a semester of school, and was now behind in everything.

Paul, like his wife, treated her like he would treat a daughter. He tried to open her up by asking questions about her life, but with little success. Other than that, he tries to help her out with English, and was delighted to learn that she was a quick learner, and often asked Percy, "Why can't you be like her?"

So Miyu didn't understand why she kept secrets from all of them. She held the card, the deceptively normal looking card to her face. "Why do you have to exist?"

Caster

She had no doubt that it was the genuine article. The card effectively possessed herself, an individual known as Medea, the Witch of Treachery.

Worse, the ancient magus knew something about her.

It scared her, more than anything else. Did she have some kind of dastardly plan for her? To use her like the Ainsworth? How much did the magus really knew?

The rest of the family was away, barring Percy, who had an urgent book report due. She was effectively by herself.

She couldn't resist. It was oh so tempting. All logic dictated her to do the exact opposite of what she was considering. But her curiosity got the best of her.

Miyu has learned a bit more about Eygptian magic. When Emily came over, Miyu implored her to teach her something new. One spell of particular interest was the privacy ward.

 _'It's mainly so that mortals will not notice and avoid the area'_ said Emily. It was frustratingly simple, compared to what she knew about spells in her own world. Simply draw several hieroglyphics on the area you want and fill it with prana.

Miyu had no use for the properties of the ward that cleared the area of mortals. Rather, she needed its ability of keeping the outside unaware of what she was casting. More specifically, she needed to hide her plan from Percy.

She looked at the card in her hand again, and slammed it down into the ground, yelling in Japanese.

 **"REVELATION!"**

A runic circle appeared on the ground around her. It held a cross, layered with symbols that Miyu couldn't understand.

 _"_ **THOU BODY BE MINE"**

It was frivolous. Crazy in fact.

 **"THOU SWORD BE AT MY HAND"**

But she wanted to make sure. To make sure it was real.

 **"HEED MY CALL IN DESIRE AND REASON! TO CONQUER THE HOLY GRAIL!**

How hypocritical. How would she conquer the Holy Grail? After all, Miyu _was_ the Grail.

 **"SWEAR TO ME NOW!"**

The prana in the circle swirled, and exploded upwards.

 **"I AM THE ETERNALNESS OF ALL GOOD AND EVIL!"**

What was the difference anyway? Good and Evil. What was the point?

 **"I AM THE ETERNALNESS OF LAID OUT EVIL!"**

That was fitting. But who was the Evil in the end? Her brother? The Ainsworth? Or was it Miyu herself. Was she evil?

 **"THOU CLAD IN THE THIRD SACRED WORD OF THE SEVENTH SKY!"**

But does she care anymore? It was all supposed to be behind her. She was supposed to be safe. To make friends. To be happy.

 **"THE HAND THAT PROTECTS THE BALANCED CIRCLE OF CONTROL!"**

The magical array responded to Miyu's wishes, and thick tendrils of light exploded from the fringes of the circle and collapsed in on Miyu.

 **"INSTALL!"**

The magical array cleared away, and the remaining magical energy cleared out all dust in the vicinity, blowing away Miyu's books and notes.

Knowledge poured into Miyu's head. She was the Witch of Treachery. Daughter of Aeëtes. Granddaughter of Helios. A mage and priestess who was the closest to the gods of her time. She was cursed. Cursed by Hera, by Aphrodite, by the _gods_. She fell in love with that _man_. That person. She needed to get revenge. She killed, killed everything the man cared about. She traveled. She was cursed and thrown away at every city. She was Medea.

No. No. NO. Miyu kept absorbing the knowledge, knowledge threatening to overwrite her identity. She was a tool to be used, just like Medea. They exploited her, not caring for her. But she wasn't Medea. She knew little magic. She wasn't a priestess to the gods. She just wanted to live her life now. She cared little about revenge, choosing to live and forget. She wasn't the Witch and Betrayal, she was Miyu.

With that, the contract was sealed. Miyu found herself kneeling on the ground, apparently blacking out from the ritual. The card disappeared.

Miyu looked down, all doubts about the card's identity sealed. She felt...stronger now. Her clothing changed. She wore a hood that concealed her features. She carried no staff, but covered in a long dark robe. The robe felt...comfortable, too comfortable, made from the finest silks known to man. Golden jewelry dangled from her neck, all filled with magic. She-

Thump Thump Thump

Someone was coming. Footsteps. PERCY! He would be here any second now.

"Uninstall." Her voice barely came out in a whisper just as the door opened.

Percy looked in the room, face filled with worry and concern just to catch a bright flash of light. When his eyes adjusted, his green irises found Miyu standing in the middle of the room. The room was a mess. Books and papers lay around the room, half opened and in awkward positions. There was something in the air, but it looked like he couldn't tell. He looked at Miyu, "What happened in here?"

Miyu panicked for a second, before thinking up a believable lie, "I was practicing a spell. It didn't go as planned." That was true. Sort of. If you tilted your head and squinted at the details.

Percy looked relieved. "Just be careful alright? You don't want to overdo it." He stepped back out of the room, and walked back to his to presumably work on his homework.

But Miyu paid no attention to that. She walked to her bed and fell on top of it.

"What do I do now, Onii-chan?" she spoke into the pillow.

* * *

 **January 14th**

Annabeth already had a clear view of Miyu.

She was a shy girl, but eager to learn. She was talented, though perhaps not as talented as some demigods were in their respective fields. She learned quickly. And most importantly...

She was so _cute_.

Annabeth never really had any inclination towards cute things before. After all, she ran away from home at the age of seven. Since then, she spent her life training, reading, studying, and fighting. Cute things were never in the schedule. Plus, only the Aphrodite cabin at camp really reveled in cute things. Any other camper associated with the word "cute" was sorta ostracized.

After all, there was no point in being cute on the battlefield.

But after meeting Miyu, Annabeth had to reexamine her point of view.

She was just looked so innocent...so naive. Now Annabeth knew that wasn't true, and that Miyu certainly had a steel inside her that most demigods never develop at her age, but Miyu just had that something that made her look...so utterly molestable!

And it drove Annabeth crazy.

Percy certainly had his cute moments. It was one of the reasons why she loved him. He looked absolutely adorable at times, especially when begging for something. Most girls and guys (don't get her started on that) couldn't resist those eyes. He looked like a baby seal. But Annabeth was now immune to that look, no matter how cute it looked...mostly immune anyway. But Miyu was cute in a different way.

"Annabeth are you ok? You blanked out." asked her father. There were walking down the busy streets of Boston, handing out "missing posters" for her cousin. Annabeth stopped walking for a moment.

Annabeth flushed, and denied, "No no, I'm just fine."

Frederick Chased laughed. "Thinking about Percy?" He was a handsome middle aged man with sandy hair and intense eyes. He was a genius, something that clearly attracted her mother, the goddess Athena. Even now, he still got looks from the woman on the street. He paid them no attention, however.

Annabeth blushed, but nodded.

"Don't worry about it. You can cuddle with Percy all you want when we get back from this," he teased. His expression suddenly soured. "Now let's go back to finding my wayward nephew." He turned and walked forward, asking someone else if they had seen Magnus.

Annabeth sighed, and killed all her thoughts about Miyu and Percy's cuteness. No, they were still there. She mentally drew her Drakon-tooth sword and cut those thoughts up. There, much better. Right now, her cousin was first priority.

Steeling her resolve, she stepped behind her father.

* * *

 **January 22nd**

Leo didn't really have any opinions of Miyu.

He was far too busy on working on the new flagship and warship sitting in the harbor. The hull and basic structures were completed, and now the workers, which consisted of several nature spirits, some couple dozen demigods who "volunteered" to do some heavy lifting, several expert Roman engineers, three former Athena campers in college, and five cyclops that Tyson rounded up to do work.

Leo quietly thanked Poseidon that the cyclops were there, as the nature spirits knew nothing about engineering, and the demigods who volunteered tended to be slackers.

When the plans to start building began in August, Leo honestly couldn't believe they were actually going to do it. He wasn't trying to be cynical, but there was the fact that the current plans for the fleet would make them the largest ships and fleet built by demigods in centuries. The new designs far outstrip _The Moniter_ , the original ironclad warship. In fact, the projected fleet would be the most formidable demigod made fleet since the Spanish fleet in the 17th century, a fleet made by Romans which was torn apart by the Greek Fleet built by Francis Drake. The ships of the two World Wars didn't exactly count, as the demigods weren't exactly the ones who built them.

Now that the months passed, Leo could finally see the fruits of his labor: A giant dreadnought with a displacement of 30,000 tons floating at the harbor. Leo would've never anticipated that it would be his biggest and proudest project. Leo always thought his legacy would be the Argo II, but he was proven wrong.

It was significantly larger than any of the Greek triremes at 40 meters long it floated next to. Heck, it absolutely dwarfed the Argo II, which was 61 meters long. It was a colossal 170 meters long. From its conception, it wasn't designed to ferry a small group of demigods, nor was it to transport them. Nay, it was made for two reasons. One was modest, a symbol of the two demigod camps' friendship and unity. The other reason? War. It was built to wage war.

The cover was that it was to siege Delphi, and in that aspect, that was absolutely true. Delphi was a fortress that no ordinary quest or expedition could ever hope to overcome. It was the reason for the ship's heavy weaponry. But that actually came in second.

Ever since the defeat of both Kronos and Gaea, there were legions of monsters roaming around that no one actually bothered to hunt down afterwards, the Olympians and demigods being far more interested in enjoying life.

There were still Giants and Titans out there, as unbelievable as it might sound. Not all of them were defeated during the wars. The ones who were still around commanded vast fortresses of weapons and monsters. Gigantic sea serpents awakened from Tartarus stirring roamed the seas, endangering settlements on the coasts. In addition, the discovery of other pantheons hastened the development of the gigantic war machines. The ships were now no longer only for eliminating threats, they were now also defensive mechanisms against other gods.

Every since Annabeth came back from her emergency family related situation, she also confirmed the existence of the Nordic Pantheon, and indirectly provided confirmation of the existence of the metaphysical god, the big G god.

That...was frightening, even more so to the Senate of Rome. As a result, development of the project was sped up.

It was around that same time that a name was chosen for the new ship. It took months for representatives from all parties, including the elder legacies in New Rome and the Cloven Elder Council, to come to a decision, but a name was finally chosen.

 _United Olympus Kymopoleia_

The name was fitting. United Olympus, a sign of the unity of the two camps. Kymopoleia, the name of the Greek goddess of violent storms. The name was chosen for several reasons, the first of which was Jason's promise to Kymopoleia. What better way to honor a deity by naming their symbol of power after it? The next reason was hope for protection from the sea. The Romans fear nothing more than the angry ocean, and the name was picked in hope that it would protect them from the fierce storms. The last reason? To symbolize the power of the vessel. To prove that Olympus was not to be reckoned with. To inspire fear of the warship, as the ocean storms of millennia past did.

The ship certainly had the power: 12 colossal 14-inch cannons, each designed to fire any number of dangerous rounds: shells full of Greek Fire, regular shells, and if need be, explosive imperial gold projectiles. The _Kymopoleia_ wasalso planned to carry countless other smaller guns. She was also to carry harpoons, nets, magical missiles, and a chicken smokescreen.

Never let it be said that the weapon designers weren't creative.

The masthead of the ship this time wasn't Leo's bronze dragon Festus. This time, it was something far more destructive.

The Romans donated their eagle to be the masthead. Every Roman legion had a golden eagle, granted to them by their patron gods. Now there was only one legion, and only one eagle left. They lost their eagle decades ago, and only recently recovered it. The eagle is the symbol of the legion's power, so Leo supposed it made a certain amount of sense for it to be installed on the dreadnought.

The eagle wasn't just a fancy piece of gold either. It allowed the standard-bearer to wield Jupiter's lightning. Entire armies stood no chance against it. In fact, the Battle of Camp Half Hill was only won thanks to the eagle incinerating large numbers of monsters who dared march against it.

In this case, the eagle was what was powering the ship. The engines, the temperature control, the electronics, all of them were powered by the golden eagle. If all went according to plan, the eagle would also be used to power certain magical attacks and defenses. Now if only it were anywhere to be seen.

It was another one of those things: both Greeks and Romans were wary of investing such a large and destructive weapon together. So it had a built-in fail safe. The Greeks had a hidden part inside the vessel that once removed, would render the ship motionless. The Romans had their eagle: if the Greeks betrayed them, their eagle would stop working, also rendering the ship a prison in water.

The news about this "Class card" put more pressure on the new vessels being constructed, to Leo's annoyance. Now the Senate was demanding additional magical defenses and increased anti-air weaponry. It was a huge burden on the ship builders and designers. After all, that was the reason why any weapon system in the United States was overpriced: politicians demanding more specs, more capabilities, more everything to a machine already half finished. It didn't help that there were apparently six more out there. Now Leo had no time to hang out with Calypso!

So for that reason, Leo cursed the Class Cards.

* * *

 **January 29th**

Thalia Grace read the report of the mysterious girl and frowned.

"Is there something wrong there, Thalia?" asked her liege, the goddess Artemis. The goddess this time took the form of a 14 year-old girl. The goddess wore silver camouflage clothing, an elegant silver bow slung on her back. This time, the goddess chose black hair with intense silver eyes. Even in that form, Thalia knew that the goddess was vastly more powerful and knowledgeable than even the diminishing numbers of the ancient hunters still in the group.

"No, but beyond some peculiarities, there's just nothing special about this girl," Thalia responded. "So what is your interest in her? She's too young to be recruited. Furthermore, she has no records of existing beyond last month. Furthermore, she has that last name."

Artemis snapped her head at looked at her lieutenant. To virtually any other huntress, that look would send them cowering and kneeling. "What last name?"

Thalia only shrugged. "Some of the older huntresses mentioned that name a few times, but they would refuse to explain anything about it. What is so important about this girl?"

Artemis looked at Thalia for a moment, engaging in a staring contest. But Thalia held her own, and the goddess looked away first. Thalia huffed in her victory, but a smirk covered her features, pleased at her win.

"It's why she is a concern."

Thalia almost didn't hear the comment from the goddess, and asked, "Wait, what do you mean by that?"

Artemis glanced at her lieutenant. "You heard about the existence of the Egyptians and Norse, right?"

Thalia blinked, and nodded. The last time she saw Annabeth, the little girl who was now older than her was clearly hiding something. But no matter how hard Annie tried, she couldn't keep it away from Thalia for long. She had her ways. "What about it?"

Artemis glanced at Thalia, "That last name belonged to a notorious assassin."

Thalia, confused, asked, "'Belonged to?' So he's dead? What's so important about this assassin?"

Artemis brought a hand to her chin, clearly in thought, before bringing forward a hand. In it, materialized a file. She then tossed the file to Thalia, who caught it in one hand.

"Look into it at your leisure. Right now, we have a stray Giant to hunt."

* * *

 **AN: Well, this chapter is short. Well, there really isn't much going on until the next class card shows up. I've got a storyboard planned out for each encounter and important events in between, but I still feel like it's missing a lot of stuff. Feel free to send me ideas of school events and filler mini quests through PM or reviews. These quests are probably not going to be all that important, something like locating and finding magical weaponry or a stray Giant/Titan showing up somewhere who wasn't killed in the previous wars.**

 **So stuff is actually happening, different groups in PJO are getting the memo that there is something off about Miyu. Oh, and Miyu actually installed a class card as an experiment. Phew.**

 **Oh, and I'm in the need for several OCs. I'm creating the bulk of them, but I'm open to ideas for them. Feel free to send me those as well.**

 **Finally, can someone give me information about Attila the Hun/Altera? I only got a very broad generalization of her history. Like her sword being the sword of a certain god, being a semi-alien, stuff like that. Thanks.**

 **As always, if you enjoy this story, be sure to favorite, follow, and review. See you in several weeks!**


	8. Chapter 8

**February 1st**

A teacher working at a certain middle school stayed late to finish off her work. She wasn't an actual teacher: she was merely "substituting" for the English teacher who suddenly had an irrational urge to move to Florida. The sun was setting, while the last of the winter snow clung to their fading solid form. Springtime was coming.

Olivia Salvius finished grading the last of her tests and filed them into her binder, to be passed out the next day. Most of her students performed... passably well, but there were only a small handful of students that the 23 year old brunette felt really put all their efforts into their work. Finished with her work, Olivia pulled out another set of folders from her cabinet.

It looked completely ordinary, just another light yellow folder to hold papers. However, unlike the ones before, not just anyone could access that file. If anyone were to try, they would open the file only to find sheets of white paper and an urge to place the file where they found it. Furthermore, the file would then be able to identify would-be perpetrators from fingerprints and magical signatures left behind. Only Olivia and a few select individuals were able to use the file without repercussions.

It was necessary, after all, the location she was in was entrenched on all sides by potential dangers. The New York metropolitan area was a hot-spot for supernatural activity, and the home of a certain group of gods. Furthermore, the Norse occupied various areas north of the city, but still had eyes in Manhattan. The Egyptians, on the other hand, held territories in the area in the form of Nomes 21 and 22: Brooklyn and Boston. Even more worrying, reports sent back to Jerusalem informed of increased interest in the region by Circe's enclave of sorceresses, a group that was usually a non-factor.

It didn't help that the usually defunct House of Life came back from a millennia long depression roaring. The reappearance of the Egyptian Pantheon put the rest of the mythological world into a frenzy. After all, it wasn't every week that a long dead pantheon suddenly returned, and then proceed to almost turn North America into a desert. It was a disaster. The gods weren't subtle about their return, and museums containing Egyptian artifacts all around the world suddenly had to be quarantined to minimize damage done.

To top it all off, there was the girl. The Greeks weren't subtle in their researching. Maybe it was because they weren't use to the internet, maybe because they were too young, but nevertheless, someone searching for information related to her father was incredibly unusual, especially since her father didn't really have a public profile and died on a mission over a decade ago. Then a person named 'Miyu Emiya' popped out of nowhere. Before the last month, she simply didn't exist.

While that was news for alarm, reports of various strange activities in the area in the last month made it clear that something wasn't right. A pillar of light appearing over Central Park, and no one was able to identify its source. Reports of a battle between the Eye of Anubis and Medea of Colchis, with the Eye of Anubis being terminated. The House of Life and Circe's Enclave were mobilizing for something. Development on the Greek warship in the Greek camp was accelerated. The Celts were unusually quiet over the last few weeks.

With that in mind, Olivia sighed, and flared her circuits. The lock on her file recognized her signature and opened up. Olivia flipped through the files until she came across a sheet of notes:

 _\- living with Son of Poseidon. demigod has no knowledge of us, but has been reported of being more cautious whenever familiars are watching him. mortal parents. mother is able to see through the barrier. family knows nothing of magic_

 _\- holds the soul of Medea? souls in Greek Afterlife can't be replicated. Medea is still alive. Further investigation required_

 _\- no blood relation with late special operations member_

 _\- no divine blood, but shows excellent situational awareness_

 _\- has magical circuits. rank: AB. knows spells, noted for Duat storage spell and reinforcement. possible usage of graduation air on 1/23/17. traces of unknown ritual in apartment. Further magical abilities unknown_

 _\- excels in all academics_

 _\- all tests with divine metals barring Stygian Iron have shown up as negative until a week ago. perhaps relatively powerful enough for the World to deem her [Valuable]_

 _\- best friends with young Egyptian magician, Emily Fabian. see page 3 for investigation on Fabian_

 _\- favorite food: cookies_

More notes filled the pages in the file. Skimming through it, Olivia put the file back in the folder and resealed the lock. Nothing made sense. But one fact was clear: something was going to happen.

* * *

 **February 4th**

Miranda Dawn didn't know what to feel.

She was Magarita Dar, just a little girl whose Jewish parents had to escape from their homeland in Russia to escape the frenzy caused by the _Protocol of the Meetings of the Elders of Zion_. She was just 9 when her family got to Ellis Island. There something irrevocably changed her life forever.

 _Rejected_

Her parents were shipped back to the land where they were being slaughtered _en masse_. Magarita wanted to go with them, but her parents refused. "Go. Live."

A young girl, with no parents or guardians wandered her way onto the streets of Manhattan. She wandered endlessly, taking in the buildings that her home never had. People bustled around, but no one paid any attention. There were always a few in the crowd that Magarita unconsciously moved away from. Not because they looked dangerous, though some of them did, but they always felt off.

Some of them had an aura of blood, few had power, others radiated pure danger.

Then one day, as Magarita passed the weeks by sleeping on the streets, she turned a corner to see a girl, perhaps a few years older than she was, stumble out of an alley way with a huge arrow stuck in her abdomen. The girl wore a simple cotton shirt and dress, but they were all smeared by the blood. She held an empty basket with one hand. The girl took one look at Magarita before collapsing on the ground. Magarita only stood there, not daring to move, partly out of fear, partly out of shock. Then as she continued staring at the girl, she _changed_.

Instead of the simple clothing, the girl donned a set of light leather and armor, all colored silver. There was no longer a basket in the girl's hands, but a large bow. A quiver, utterly devoid of arrows, was slung on the corpse's back. Only the arrow in her gut remained unchanged.

A few seconds later, a large policeman stepped around the corner and spotted the dead girl on the ground. The air around the man was blurry, and Magarita, perhaps under some instinct, started backing away from the man. Magarita blinked, and suddenly the world became clearer. The man in front of her lost the police attire, but instead wore black leather armor with a massive rifle slung on his back. Cruel light brown eyes glanced at the corpse at his feet, and then turned to Magarita, who at that point also collapsed and sat on the ground five feet away.

"Huh, a magician," spoke the man, in perfect Russian. The man then smiled, and pointed his rifle at the girl. "How interesting,"

Before Magarita could react, the man suddenly turned his head and disappeared into thin air. In his place, a volley of silver arrows took his place. A few seconds later, a crowd of young teenage girls wearing the same attire as the corpse appeared. The girl at the front of the group, who looked slightly older than the rest, examined the scene, and took note of Magarita, who still sat on the ground. She snapped her fingers and spoke, "Nothing happened here, run along now," in Russian with a slight accent.

Magarita blinked but didn't move for a moment. She glanced back at the group of girls, the corpse, and back at the older girl speaking to her. Nodding her head, she picked herself up and ran.

Since then, the world seemed much more harsh for the girl. Monsters seemed to be in every crowd. Some had horns. Some only had one eye. Others had no feet. But life went on.

A month later, when Magarita woke up on the side of the building in the alley she was sleeping in, she found a woman standing in front of her, as if waiting for woman wore a black fur dress, something only the rich could afford. Green eyes scanned Magarita, as if reading a book. The then woman spoke, in perfect Russian,"I have a home for you, if you would like. Do you want to come?"

Magarita ordinarily would've ran away there and then. Nothing that suspicious was good. But she felt safe with the woman. She could trust the woman. Who wouldn't?

Then her life changed again.

Circe's island was a marvel and a shock for Magarita. Somewhere she could stay, eat food, be taken care of as long if she worked hard enough for it. It shocked her on the basis that the scripture she was raised on was a lie. There were other gods. There were many of them. From many cultures. In one week, Magarita's world was turned upside down.

The woman provided a good deal. Apparently the woman, named Circe, was planning on projecting her influence and power. Part of that was gaining more followers.

Magarita accepted, and her life began anew.

A new life demanded a new name. A western name, not the Russian one from her last life. And Miranda Dawn was born.

Miranda diligently studying the inner workings of magic. She wasn't the most talented initiate Circe had, not the most knowledgeable, not the most powerful, but the most hardworking.

Circe's initiates were diverse and varied. Some of them were like Miranda: immigrants who were starting a new life. Some of them were apparently Greek and Roman demigoddesses who found their way to the island. Others were apparently former Amazons who joined as the female warrior civilization seemed to be on its last legs.

Miranda wasn't ostracized like she was in Russia. In fact, the others put up with her limited knowledge of the English language, something Miranda worked quickly to rectify.

After two years of learning the basics of magic, the initiates were given the choice of specializing in a certain field. Miranda was suddenly faced with deciding on a field to specialize. Some of her friends chose combat, others the study of ancient magic. Others decided to specialize in the development of new applications of magic.

Miranda, after weeks of tearing herself apart, decided to choose the field of magic item creation.

Miranda was already considered somewhat as a "support mage," after all. In training, she had the most proficiency in healing and barrier spells, along with spells that can enhance a person's physical abilities. Sure, Miranda could perform offensive spells if she so wished, but she disliked combat.

Furthermore, magical item creation was a valued field in the supernatural world. Gods and Goddesses frequently bought magical items made by various groups to gift to their children (what, do you think those fell from trees?) and they were always in demand.

Miranda dove into her new studies with even more fervor than her initial work. After countless hours of research and testing, Miranda created her first original magical item: a hate that turned the wearer invisible.

.

.

.

She was out of ideas back then, okay? It wasn't poorly made: the magic was self powering and everything. It just came with the design flaw of most invisibility items that ensured any experienced magic user would be able to tell in a second that something was there. Plus, she was 12 when she made it, and took a few liberties with Hades' Helm of Invisibility. Miranda pawned it off the enclave's thrift store, which was essentially a shop in Manhattan where all the unwanted magical items made on Circe's island went.

It did however, catch the attention of Circe. Making a magical item of that caliber at the age of twelve was no small feat.

Since then, Miranda quickly developed a level of skill in crafting magical items unmatched except by elder sorceresses who were centuries, if not millennia old and Circe herself over Miranda's next several years as a sorceress in training.

When Miranda was 23, she was shocked to find that the elder sorceresses chose to offer Miranda the chance to extend her lifespan.

Mages already lived long lifespans: The most powerful ones can live centuries (Circe of course, was immortal). But there existed certain rituals that allowed individuals to extend their lifespans to millennia. The longest lifespan recorded for any magician at the time was Iskandar, the Chief Lector of the House of Life, who was 2217 years old at the time. The ritual took massive resources to perform, so only the most distinguished were allowed to 'ascend.'

Sorceresses who were chosen to ascend were allowed to choose whether or not they wanted to, or to simply live life. In fact, the majority of sorceresses chosen to ascend instead choose to not ascend, choosing instead to live out their lives.

But Miranda instead chose to ascend. After all, it was the only life she had. Others on the island had relatives on the mainland, but Miranda had nowhere else to go. So for her, it was an easy choice then.

Since then, the years flashed by. Both World Wars occurred, and many initiates raced back to their families and to assist them in the war. Two generations of mages died. Many of Miranda's friends died in the war. The few that survived came back stronger, more sure of themselves, but not more dedicated to their studies. Many of them left again. Some of them ventured back to the Amazons. Some went to join Camp Jupiter. Others just disappeared.

Recruitment started again after World War II. Outposts were established on the mainland to recruit new initiates. An alliance with the Amazons were made based on trade. The Island now produced a good portion of the Amazon's more specialized equipment: magical cages for monsters, enchanted weaponry, and other assorted essentials. The Amazons in turn provided the enclave a center for them to recruit new members. It was a mutually beneficial system. There were decades of prosperity for both parties.

But then _he_ came. And released the most notorious prisoners the enclave held.

Life was harsh since the spawn of Poseidon released the Pirates. The special medicine of Hermes (he called them vitamins) given to Odysseus was the bane of all mages. Once consumed, not even gods would be able to hurt the person who ate it with magic. The medicine didn't simply reject all foreign prana from the host body, which undoes any transformations or curses afflicted to the target, it enhances and creates a torrent of prana several meters wide surrounding the user who ate it for a short period of time. The result? Any magic wielder in a certain radius were essentially helpless against anyone who ate even one piece. Even if the magic user was far away enough to cast magic, the medicine also created a shield surrounding the person that would mitigated most spells.

It was only a slight relief to magic users worldwide that there was only one reliable supplier of the medicine: which ironically enough, was Circe's enclave of sorceresses.

After they were used by Odysseus, Circe managed to spirit away a few pieces for study. Though they were incredibly useful for anyone fighting a mage, they were of even more benefit to any aspiring magic user. Its ability to essentially temporarily enhance one's magical production capabilities by literal hundred-folds while making them virtually immune to other mages was invaluable.

The problem? They were costly. The production of just one costed upwards of a hundred thousand US dollars. It was utterly unfeasible to make more than just a few. Simply put, they were only ever used for emergencies.

When the pirates were unleashed, armed with the vitamins, sorceresses scattered. Few members of the enclave were proficient in melee combat. As a result, many members were mortally wounded and captured. It was a godsend for the sorceresses when the vitamins wore off, and the pirates were forced off the island.

But it came at a cost. The pirates took a number of initiates as prisoners. The pirates also dealt millions of dollars in damage, damage that the island's insurance provider refused to cover, claiming that the damage done was because of Circe holding them hostage in the first place, so they aren't obligated to cover it.

After the _incident_ , large numbers of initiates left. Some joined the Amazons again, who happily accepted them. Others searched for the Hunters of Artemis, a group that relatively sees eye and eye with Circe. But others stayed to rebuild.

With their main base of operations destroyed, the remaining elder sorceresses and Circe came to a decision to open the enclave's services to the highest bidder. The decision came at a perfect time. War was brewing in the Greek Pantheon.

The enclave produced magical items at an unprecedented rate, and it was Miranda's department which became the most important. The items produced were sold to different groups with no discrimination. The Romans needed equipment to break the siege on Mount Othrys. Miranda's department provided. The Titans wanted enchantments and armor for their cruise ship. Circe performed the rituals herself. A farmer somewhere needed fireproof horse pens. The enclave was paid top dollar. When the children of Hecate threw their lot in with the Titans, it was the enclave who personally tutored them. All for funds.

The war effectively saved the enclave. Money poured in from many sources, regardless of who supported the gods or who defied them. Within a year, the island was rebuilt, stronger than before.

During the Second Gigantomachy, the enclave this time threw their lot in with the Olympians, or more accurately, the Hunters and Amazons. After all, Orion was a nuisance to all of them. He attacked warehouses, slayed elder sorceresses, and destroyed property. The Hunters patrolled the area and had experience with the giant, while the Amazons set up the trap. The enclave? They were instrumental in monitoring Orion's location and most importantly were crucial in pulling the Son of Hades and comrades off course.

However, now that both wars were over, the enclave struggled to find a new purpose. Its infrastructure was turned into a manufacturing center and lab for weapons by the wars. The enclave overhauled their organization, and started a recruitment drive. Mortals with potential were sought out, and reincarnated sorceresses who joined Gaia were given refuge. The organization went on its daily business. But last month, something new happened.

It started off as nothing, but just a mere anomaly. Those weren't uncommon, as most could be traced to the gods having petty arguments. Nevertheless, Medea, one of the two reincarnated sorceresses who were given refuge, felt the need to investigate.

That investigation led to the discovery of an object containing a soul. While that by itself the object wasn't special, what was of note was that the soul inside was a copy. Of Medea. The same Medea who was still alive. And a person would be able to harness its power if certain conditions were met. There were apparently six more of such cards, of which were all more powerful than the one Medea encountered.

The cards were unknown elements: despite having one of the most complete library in the mythological world, scholars on the island were unable to identify it. And according to Medea, the [Caster] card was able to simultaneously defeat 4 magicians in the House of Life in combat. 3 of the magicians were ex-hosts of gods, one of them being the pharaoh, another being the magician who was able to use the most Egyptian Divine Words, and the last a magician capable of harnessing the power of the fiercest Egyptian warrior goddess. Defeating any of them would have been an impressive achievement by themselves, but the last magician blew them all out of the water: the Eye of Anubis.

Subduing a deity is near impossible for any mortal. Sure, humans defeating gods wasn't unheard of, but most of the time it was just a sham. After all, to most gods, even the most respectful ones, to judge themselves seriously with a mortal was insulting to them. They hold back. They never use all their might, but when they do, the candidates capable of defeating them dwindle.

The Eye of a God was the highest form a god could take before ascending to their true form. It was the most energy efficient form for a deity, as well as providing them a solid connection to the physical world. If Kronos and the Son of Hermes achieved that form, the defense of Manhattan would have been a foregone conclusion. If Set achieved it with Amos Kane, then the god's relatives and their hosts never would have been able to snatch victory away from him in the last second. Mortals achieving perfect unity with a deity changed the course of human history.

As a result, defeating an Eye of a God was close to impossible. Virtually every recorded case (and there weren't many) of one being defeated in combat were by other gods, other Eyes, or monsters so powerful that even the Gods fear them.

So the cards were treated with interest. After all, they were immensely powerful. Medea reported that the cards had no divine signature of any kind, meaning that it wasn't made by the gods. If it wasn't made by the gods, that meant a human, or perhaps some other race made it. If so, that meant it might be possible to replicate them.

However there was a small problem: the cards will show up in New York City, an area in which the enclave didn't have a presence. Sure, the thrift store they owned there was tolerated, but enclave hosting reincarnated humans, many of whom served Gaia, put them in conflict with many of groups in power in New York. All but one.

That was why Miranda, along with Medea and Circe, were in Brooklyn.

The negotiations were rocky at first, but the two groups eventually came to an agreement. The Egyptians would allow them to build a base in Brooklyn in exchange for information on magic they don't know. In addition, the Egyptian showed interest in purchasing some of the products the enclave produced. There may be even more benefits for both sides in the near future.

But, as Miranda stood watching the sun set from the roof of Brooklyn House, she couldn't help but wonder what times were ahead. They've made new allies, which the enclave now needed more than ever since they've alienated the Amazons and Hunters by giving refuge to reincarnated humans. They would have a new foothold in the area, which was hotly contested between many groups.

She was interested in studying the cards, yes, but Miranda couldn't help thinking that those items weren't what they seemed. Why were there seven of them? How is it possible for one of them to contain a copy of a soul? Perhaps they were dealing with something out of their league.

So many questions, so little answers.

* * *

 **February 5th**

Amos Kane cursed the world.

He sat in his study, drinking a cup of whiskey as he thought over the events that transpired the previous night.

Just two years ago, he had the sole responsibility of keeping watch over Brooklyn. It was a large responsibility, due to the Nome's proximity to the home of the Greek Gods. But it was peaceful. Every once in a while, he would talk to Chiron and work out some issues, and if necessary, he would defeat the odd monster that wanders the streets.

Him taking charge of the 21st Nome was in a way a punishment for his family's transgressions.

Julius Kane, his brother, decided to break the millennia long taboo of interfering with the gods. Though he had a "good" reason, Amos couldn't help but wonder if anything would've changed if his foolish brother and sister-in-law just decided to stick with tradition.

As a "punishment," Amos was essentially banished to be the sole tenant of the 21st Nome, to be the ambassador to the Olympian Gods.

He could remember standing in the same room with one, simply negotiating his stay. The wave of power rolling off the being's figure. Gray eyes that peered into his soul, as if already knowing all about him. He hoped that he will never have to be in the proximity of a deity again.

But that wish was not to be, as his brother decided that when losing his wife wasn't enough, he had to go bigger.

Of course, the past couldn't be undone, and the future looked bright for the House of Life. Amos was now the head of the House of Life, the most powerful magician in the world, but at what cost?

Hundreds, if not thousands of magicians lay dead from the civil war. The old ways were irrevocably destroyed. The upper hierarchy of the House of Life was shattered, leaving a power void that he can barely fill. The gods returned, but was that a good thing? Chaos was obliterated, but were they messing with the natural balance of things?

He could only thank Thoth that the deeper implications of what his dear brother did failed to reach his nephew's and niece's ears.

The House of Life, which was always undermanned and under-powered since the Fall of Rome was now figuratively in ruins. A darker part of him thought it was only fitting: a new age to reflect the color change in the Hall of Ages.

It would be a different age, one not too dissimilar from the ages of the distant past. It will be a violent age, Amos decided, one to truly test whether or not the Path of the Gods were the right way. But this time, the focus of violence won't be localized. It won't be a simple civil war or one with their neighbors. It will follow the path of civilization, of _globalization_.

 _'And the details of this conflict will reflect the outcome of these cards'_

Thinking of the Sorceress of the Island's words, Amos glanced at the paper on his desk.

It was simple and plain, but the moment he laid eyes on it Amos knew it was special.

A Geis. The universal way to bind a being to an agreement, a contract. Oh, each mythology had a myriad of different ways to form binding oaths, these methods don't hop mythologies. A Shinto exorcist cannot be bound to the River of Styx. An _eidolon_ cannot be banished with an Egyptian banishing technique. But out of all of the hundreds of binding contracts, only the Church's Geis allows agreements across pantheons. Maybe because the different forms of the religion of Abraham dominated the globe, maybe because The God was just above all else, but that was just the way it was.

The truth was that the House of Life was facing extinction in the near future. The recent war against Chaos left the House of Life in a position similar to its stance after the Romans took Alexandria. The civil war affected every magician. Lives were lost, Nomes destroyed, ancient families fractured.

And the _knowledge_. Attacks on various Egyptian artifacts around the planet. Libraries of the most prominent Nomes destroyed. The Great Library of the First Nome itself was burned to the ground.

And if that wasn't enough, there were multiple insurrections all around the world. Emboldened by the deaths of not one, but two Chief Lectors, along with over a score of the most powerful magicians in the House of Life, there was suddenly rebellions cropping up in various Nomes. Empowered by various Gods, Amos had to constantly put them down.

And then s _he_ came and offered him a deal, one that he was currently agonizing over.

The Enclave of Circe was in many ways like the House of Life. Though smaller, in a way they were both keepers of ancient knowledge. But the Enclave was on a whole other level from the House of Life.

They were the only group who kept their knowledge through the various collapses of civilization in the West. Dark Ages after Dark Ages pass, but the Enclave would selfishly hoard the knowledge they have.

Few groups in the West can match that record. And those who do can't compete with the sheer scale of the amount of knowledge the Enclave contained.

And the Enclave wanted to make an alliance with the House of Life.

It was a deal that Amos couldn't refuse. In exchange for rights to build a base in Brooklyn and trade agreements, the Enclave would allow scholars access to their libraries and goods.

Including their famed "Magic Pill."

Having access to their library would allow the House of Life to rebuild their libraries in a couple of years rather than over several decades or even centuries. Their records would allow Egyptian scholars access to new spells and rituals lost since the Ptolemaic Dynasty. It might save the House of Life.

But doing so would make the House of Life in the crossfire of international relations. The House of Life was essentially neutral in international affairs for millennia. But the Enclave had associations all around. They were especially closely affiliated with the Hunters of Artemis and the Amazons, two very powerful groups. Furthermore, the Enclave typically had the animosity of most Hellenistic demigods and the Norse as a whole. Associating with Circe was a grave risk. If he agreed, he would seal the House of Life's fate in with the Enclave's.

'But a risk we must take,' thought Amos. Sitting up in his chair, the Chief Lector of the House of Life of Egypt pulled the document to the front of his desk. Scanning over the document one final time to check for discrepancies, he pulled a pen from his desk drawer and signed his name.

The document flashed, signalling the completion of the contract. Amos stood up from his desk and stared out the window of his study. The skyline of Manhattan loomed in the horizon.

"I wonder what would Carter think if he knew just what dire straits we are in."

* * *

 **AN: While short, this took a while to write. I was really busy with the NA release of F/GO. Gave up on getting a 5* servant after rolling a Saber Alter. And then my brother pissed me off by rolling two Wavers.**

 **If you are enjoying this story, please favorite and follow!**

 **Also, please please review. They are really helpful to us writers.**

 **Credit: RedRat8 for OC. Make some changes though.**

 **See you guys next time!**


	9. Chapter 9

**Wow, we passed 200 followers. I never expected that anyone would actually like this story.**

 **I think this is one of my fastest updates ever! Well, my opinion of this chapter isn't incredibly high, but please enjoy.**

 **Happy Fourth of July!**

* * *

 **February 11th**

In stories and myths, heroes will rise up in times of need to defend the world from whichever crisis it was facing.

Some of those heroes did so because they seek glory. Others just wanted to save people. A few aspired to be heroes.

These "heroes" have varying origins. Some were trained from birth. Others had tragic backstories. A few had an ordinary life before answering the call.

But what happened to those heroes? What were their fates? Where was their reward for their heroic behavior?

Some of them became tyrants themselves only to be dethroned by the next "hero." Others were burned, some at the stake. Some were ridiculed for their wishes and aspirations. Often enough, they faded into obscurity.

But no matter what "heroic" acts they performed, whichever impossible deed they performed, life will go on, usually without difference.

That was what Hazel Levesque thought, months after the Second Gigantomachy.

She never wanted to be a hero in the first place, preferring to live life as it was. In truth, during Gaia's war against the gods, most of the time she didn't know why she even bothered. She did her part decades ago, before she died. It was her obligation to defeat her creation in Alaska. But after that? There were scores of demigods who were more qualified than her, yet they chose her. It was mostly because of the friendship she had with Percy, Frank, and Arion, she decided.

It was selfish, and why couldn't she be? The most revered heroes in history and mythology weren't the idealized version most think of them are, but rather just humans as well. Theseus effectively disposed of his stepfather and stepmother and stole the throne of Athens from Medus for himself. He was an usurper, carrying no trace of the good King of Athen's blood. He then squandered his kingdom in the most disgusting way possible...by chasing women.

Heracles just wanted to live a normal life, but that life was ruined in every way by the wrath of his namesake, Hera. In return, after millennia of neglect, he became a god who didn't care anymore, and lived his days wallowing about his mortal life.

Jason of the Argonauts, was also a vile man, no matter how well deserved he was. He took advantage of a princess who was bewitched by the gods to love him unconditionally. She tricked, murdered, and suffered for him, saving him from death many times. And what did he do? He married her and bore several children with her, only to turn his back on her once a princess and kingdom was offered to him.

Yes thought Hazel, it wasn't incorrect to be selfish, no matter how wrong it may be.

After the war, Hazel was made Centurion of the 5th Cohort. It was a great honor, and she was perhaps the youngest demigod to become a Centurion.

But by the month's end, she resigned.

Hazel never had aspirations for Centurion. Frankly, she only accepted because of the potential backlash of what may happen if she didn't. Her fears of being Centurion were confirmed. The campers never treated her like they treated Gwen, or even Dakota. Frankly, Hazel had a nagging feeling that they only listened to her due to her position and status.

The 5th Cohort wasn't exactly elevated back to the top legion either. Though their reputation was much better now the eagle was back, just having their reputation improved does nothing on the battlefield. During war games, the 1st Cohort, eager to regain their glory after the incident with Octavion, fought tooth and nail to uphold their position in the Legion.

In the end, what determined which Cohort was the most proficient in combat wasn't what gear they had, morale, or reputation.

It was discipline and training.

Though the 1st Legion was sometimes mocked as a place for the kids of families of rich parents, their reputation of the best Cohort wasn't unearned.

Sure, the 5th Legion won sometimes now. "Sometimes." After the first war game with Percy Jackson, the 1st and 2nd Cohort never let their guard down again. Flag-bearers were always at attention. Water cannons were no longer haphazardly fired - now a Centurion personally directed the blasts.

Sure, Hazel could simply level the foundations of the fort, or if that didn't work, simple collapse a wall of the fortress. But she never took that step. Why?

Partly because of pity, partly because of shame. Pity in that if she wished so, the war game would've been broken, and shame because it was essentially cheating. Other demigods didn't have the liberties of special powers. It was something that nagged her since the legendary infamous game of Jackson. If she was one of them, how would she feel if she essentially had no chance of winning because her opponent had a cheat skill?

Then her maybe relationship with Frank fell apart. Sure, they were still good friends, but their attractions to one another was just that: a simple crush. Perhaps it was the age gap that did them in. In the end, both of them decided whatever spark that the two had either burned out, or never existed at all. In addition, Frank's serious attitude to his job as Praetor left him with little free time as it was.

So Hazel decided to quit. The responsibility of Centurion just wasn't for her. In fact, life at Camp Jupiter didn't appeal to her anymore. She wanted to explore the world, to see the differences between then and now. Being brought 70 years into the present left her very "behind" in current events.

However, one was not allowed to leave Camp Jupiter, and by extension New Rome without express permission by the Senate, the elders, or one of the Praetors.

Luckily, since the Romans still didn't trust Iris-messaging very much (any trained fool could potentially intercept one. The Hecate cabin confirmed this) and needed a reliable way to communicate to their new sister camp if necessary.

They didn't like being the ones not able to communicate with the others.

So Reyna officially named Hazel the Roman ambassador to Camp Half-Blood...and to the Amazons, and Hunters, and everyone else because Camp Jupiter didn't have anyone to fill those jobs yet. It was both as a favor to Hazel wanting to step away from the Legion while being the best choice.

After all, her brother was one of the Campers, and she knew demigods there. The Amazons were on good terms with her due to some prophecy regarding her steed, Arion, and she was a girl, so the Hunters wouldn't castrate her. As a sweet bonus, Arion was a super-fast horse, and Hazel now knew had to shadow-travel if necessary.

In an odd twist, she was now called "Ambassador of Pluto," now that her brother went to live in Camp Half-Blood permanently.

Figures.

But since her role as "Ambassador of Rome" wasn't exactly defined, her duties were really lax.

As result, she was basically allowed to do whatever she wanted until Reyna or Frank had something for her to do, whether it was to negotiate with the Greeks, visit Olympus, negotiating again with the Amazons, or to keep track of nature spirits.

For the past half year, Hazel basically drifted between state to state, exploring.

She learned basic use of modern electronic devices, and got herself a new smartphone, though she couldn't figure most of the "apps" on it.

She discovered some more basic usage of magic, which turned out to be far more complex than Hazel could've imagined. She could now not only create illusions, but mess around with memories, create spheres of light, and create weapons out of it. Oh, and along the way picked up on a bit of alchemy. It turned out that gold that was transformed from lead didn't share her curse.

But what she enjoyed the most were the cities.

The New Orleans she lived in back then and the New Orleans that today were very different. The Orleans she knew was a shrinking city, filled with people leaving to fight in the war and to better prospects. It fell behind other cities.

The New Orleans of the present was new, due to the reconstruction of the city from the fierce hurricanes. A sprawling metropolis, but noticeably smaller than some of the larger cities Hazel visited.

...It was different, but still made Hazel feel homesick. Many of the details which made the city what it was were still there. The riverboats, the mixing of cultures, the languages spoken - in a sense, New Orleans didn't change at all.

Her days were peaceful, and she planned to continue indulging in her new peace.

But now something else was happening.

It felt like some kind of cosmic joke, but for a demigod, your life could literally be a cosmic joke, so Hazel gave the Fates some leeway on that. But she still felt furious that her hard-earned peace was now in danger.

The spirits were talking, about something happening in New York. How certain areas had a malevolent feel in the air, as if something dangerous was watching them. Hazel could confirm it, as a child of the underworld she could somewhat feel the spirits' concern. Seven very powerful spirits were lurking under the city. Spirits powerful enough to make the eidolons Piper convinced to feel like jokes.

And now, people were moving. New alliances were being made, weapons were being distributed, the brightest minds in magic were moving to the area.

How she knew? Well, ever since her encounter with Hecate, her dreams felt...different. They were no longer mere visions of the present or the past, but vague notions of the future. Oh, the dreams were never clear, and needed a fair amount of interpretation, but somehow she just knew.

That was why she was riding Arion at supersonic speed across the Appalachians. She needed to know what was going on. _Rome_ needed to know what was going on.

* * *

 **February 12th**

Walt was dead.

It probably was truth, even a month ago, but Sadie stubbornly refused to believe it.

None of their healing techniques worked. Ancient curatives, time reversal, magic restoration, no Egyptian magic worked. Then they turned to modern medicine. None of those worked either. Then they asked the gods. No help from them. Nothing worked. The magicians were ready to give up, but Sadie protested, stating that there was still hope.

And then the House of Life made an alliance with this "Enclave." Before hearing of them, Sadie knew that Greek magic existed, but believed that there were no actual people specializing in the craft outside of a few demigods. Even then, what association could rival theirs?

Sadie was wrong.

The Enclave wasn't any small group of sorceresses (they were apparently all female), but an incredibly influential group with very deep pockets. With a population of 500 sorceresses on their main island, with over a 500 more scattered around the world, they were no small group. In fact, they were one of the most powerful independent group in the Greco-Roman Pantheon, with only the full might of New Rome, the Amazons, and several monster legions above them.

It turned out that while important, Camp Half-Blood was only a mid ranking member of organizations in the Americas.

On the day of Amos met with the Enclave's leader, Circe, Sadie only got a brief glance at the two other sorceresses accompanying Medea.

They were all young women.

Alright, perhaps "young" was the wrong word to describe them. Especially since Medea was technically a reincarnated soul from millennia ago, Circe was alive since the times of Ancient Greece, and Miranda was...old.

They didn't look like magicians. Egyptian magicians wore specially enchanted clothing for either casting spells or as defensive shields. Egyptian magicians wore amulets, magical items which can store energy or be used to perform spells. Egyptian magicians carried wands and staves as conduits of their magical energy.

One could not tell the Sorceresses were Sorceresses at first. They looked like supermodels, with fancy attire. But when Sadie peered closer, she began noticing details. The necklaces they wore had a disproportionate amount of magical energy(prana, they called it). Maybe they served as shields, or as extra energy like amulets. The clothing they wore were laced with "prana," but for whatever reason Sadie could only guess. Even their eyes seemed to be different. At a first glance, they seemed comforting and full of color, but Sadie didn't miss out on how their eyes darted out at every detail, analyzing every structure, studying everyone in the room.

Sadie wouldn't have cared about them all too much outside of presenting the information to Annabeth, but then again, these Sorceresses use magic. _Greek_ Magic. They could help Walt.

When Sadie asked Miranda later when the teenage Magician found the Sorceress wandering the city, the Sorceress surprisingly obliged.

The sorceress didn't seem to match the description of Circe that Carter recited towards Sadie when the two were digging through Old Greek Myths. Circe didn't exactly show the disdain of males in general to anyone in the 21st Nome (yet). So Sadie decided to ask why didn't Circe didn't act like what the myths say.

When Miranda heard the question, she laughed.

"Circe doesn't really _hate_ men, she just likes...showing them their places."

"And where would that place be?" asked Sadie.

Miranda stopped laughing. She peered at Sadie the same way Amos sometimes looked at her. "Who knows?" the sorceress whispered.

Sadie didn't know what to say, and Miranda didn't follow her statement up with anything.

After a moment, Miranda snapped out of her stupor, "I'm sorry, but do you need anything?"

Sadie asked, "You are an expert at magic right?"

Miranda nodded.

"So do you know any spells for healing?"

Miranda frowned, "I'm not a specialist, but I know a decent number of spells. Why do you ask?"

Now here's the hard part. "Well you see, I have a friend. He got really hurt a month ago. I was hoping you could see what is wrong with him."

Miranda winced. "You have already tried all the healing spells you know right?"

"Um...yeah, but I was hoping that maybe you might know of more spells."

"What did he get hurt by?"

"Well, you see..."

Over the next few minutes as Sadie explained just how Walt got injured, she didn't miss how the look on Miranda's face kept falling.

"...but we haven't been able to heal him since then," finished Sadie.

Miranda wore a mask that Sadie took a minute to decipher. Emotions were never her strong point, evidenced by her emotional toil with Walt and Anubis, but even she saw the pity ingrained in the woman's expression.

"...What do you know about the Path of the Gods?" the sorceress tentatively asked.

Sadie blinked. "It's a ancient way of magic in which magicians can 'host' gods, and draw upon their powers.

Miranda nodded, "That definition in essence is correct, if a little restrictive. However, it isn't restricted to magicians."

Sadie thought back to her encounter with Nekhbet, "I know. Apparently demigods can also host gods."

Miranda nodded again, "Yes, but not only Egyptian gods can find hosts."

Sadie was startled. Hosting gods weren't exclusive to the Egyptians? But Percy and Annabeth never mentioned any of them hosting a god, besides that tidbit with Nekhbet. "How is that possible?"

Miranda shrugged. "Deities can take many different forms. They can put part of their essence into various objects, like a statue or an artifact. Some prefer to traverse the mortal world in human-like bodies. Others-"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, I get," Sadie interrupted, "get to the point."

If Miranda was offended by Sadie's rude behavior, she didn't show it. "Deities from different pantheons are different, but are the same in some ways."

Miranda paused, as if expecting Sadie to come to some epiphany.

"I don't get it."

Miranda sighed, "Basically, let me use the Egyptian and Greek gods as an example, since it will make things easier to explain, seeing as we are from these pantheons."

Sadie gestured for Miranda to continue.

"You probably already compared how the two groups' gods differ from one another. The Greco-Roman gods prefer to to use a form they create as their host. This variety of host are similar to regular humans, albeit different from actual mortals in several ways. Egyptian gods, in contrast, prefer to take the form of something in the mortal plane that already exists, rather than creating a new form entirely. Both of these ways have their own positives and pitfalls. They are just the god prefer to take. You understand?"

Sadie was no expert at magic or in what gods actually were like (though most thought she did), but the fourteen year got the general gist of the conversation.

"Greek gods can find hosts if they wanted to, and Egyptian gods possess a 'true' form, but they usually don't."

Alright, at this point it seemed that Miranda was dragging her explanation for too long. "So? What does this have to do with Walt?"

"Fine I'll cut to the chase." Miranda's eyes flashed, "What happens to the person after using too much magic?"

"When a person runs out of reserves, they can literally burn themselves inside out from using their own life force as the energy required." It was territory that Sadie didn't want to look into. After all, Walt didn't run out of magic, he had Anubis to supply it for him after all.

Miranda winced. "That is true, but when hosting gods," the sorceresses breath hitched, "...things happen."

Sadie was alarmed. Whatever the sorceress knew, it wasn't good. "What is it? What happens?"

The sorceress hesitated, before taking a deep breath, "Though theoretically a host of a god, especially an Eye of a God, have access to an infinite amount of prana, in practice it isn't so.

After all, in the end, no matter how much energy a human had access to, there are limits to a human's magic.

Demigods, Magicians, and others might have a slight leeway in that rule, they were still human.

Humans were humans. We were limited. Our physical containers are limited.

Our bodies can only hold so much prana, and in turn we can only process so much."

Sadie's face fell more and more, as pieces of Miranda's explanation slowly matched up with Walt's condition. "He processed too much magical energy. What does that mean?"

Miranda looked uncomfortable. "Our connection with magic is through our souls. If we damage our connection we magic..."

Miranda didn't state the direct consequences, but the implications were terrifying. "So anyone who damages themselves will end up like that?"

"Not always," Miranda said, shooting up hope in Sadie's heart, before quickly shooting it down, "But they will likely never be able to use magic again, or may be crippled for life."

So Walt can be saved, though he won't be able to use magic again. That wasn't too bad-

"But the same can't be said about those burned to death by hosting gods," whispered Miranda.

* * *

As the sun set, cars and pedestrians rushed back to their homes. After all, though the nearby Manhattan was "the city that never slept," other areas did have to. But none of them paid any attention to a young teenager in tears on a bench.

 _"If one dies of magical overcharge while hosting a god, especially while being an Eye, then their soul gets absorbed by the deity."_

Those words, by the foreign mage, couldn't be true.

Upon hearing them, Sadie yelled at the sorceress, how she was a liar, how it wasn't funny, but couldn't help but connect the dots.

A _Ren_ was a person's true name and identity. It was a fifth of an Egyptian soul. But when one was hosting a god, when one was an Eye, are you still you? Or are _you_ the god? _Ren_ are supposed to be shared only with yourself and loved ones, implying an intimate relationship. But there was nothing more intimate than being an Eye. After all, as one, both individuals are given uncanny information about their guest/host.

A _Ba_ was a person's personality, and like the _Ren_ it was a fifth of an Egyptian soul. But when hosting a god, the personalities of both parties typically clashed, and then were molded together, again, especially when an Eye was born. So in that case too, the host of the soul becomes the soul of the god.

The _Sheut_ was the shadow of a person, or more accurately the influence of that person left behind by death. Again it was a fifth of a soul. But when one became an Eye, both sides made the same actions, the same _influence_ , making any mark on the world both of theirs.

 _Ib_ , the heart, another part of the soul. The seat of will, thought, and intention. But gods can influence hosts in all these areas. In a way, a host of a god already gave up that part of his soul.

And finally, the _Ka_. The "vital spark" to a being's life. The part powering the soul. The part of the soul that leaves the body when a person dies.

But Walt's soul never "left" his body. The ritual of opening the mouth didn't work when applied to Walt (something that Sadie vehemently protested against). Walt should still be alive, if the ritual didn't work, but... it all made sense.

Most members of the House of Life were still wary about the Path of the Gods, even when shown it was the right way. From what Sadie heard, some splinter groups of the House denied the assistance of various gods when they did offer their help. Before talking with Miranda, Sadie thought they were being stubborn, but now?

Well, people say the best lies have a grain of truth in them.

In fact, Sadie was growing more and more sure of why the Path of the Gods were prohibited in the first place.

 _Because they wanted to keep their souls_

Sadie never paid much attention to religious issues during class, having knowing the Egyptian gods actually existed, but even Sadie knew about how the concept of a soul was viewed in ancient times.

It was sacred, the essence of what made an individual who they were. Priests were those ready to give their life and soul to serve the gods. But to the common populous? They relied on the thought though that though their lives literally sucked, as long as they lived a virtuous life that pleased the gods, they would have a shot at eternal paradise. It made their hardships worth it, something that let them take their hearts away from their suffering.

In short their lives were nothing, but their soul?

It was the soul that was granted all those special privileges. It was the soul that lived to the afterlife. Egyptian pharaohs and gods went through painstaking efforts to keep their soul secure and safe. Tomb-raiders smashed their sarcophaguses to ensure that the soul of the deceased cannot harm them after their crime. If their soul was gone, what was the point?

Ancient magicians, though they congregated near temples weren't priests. Oh sure, all pharaohs and priests were magicians, but not the other way around. The gods were seen as almighty rulers who they had to listen to. And they could destroy your soul if you fail.

Sadie then had a sudden revelation about her Greek friends. Didn't a Lucas host a evil god and lead a rebellion against the Olympian Gods? Huh, Sadie morbidly thought, she would have to ask her friends about whatever happened to him.

So Walt was dead. Wait, it was worse than death. He was _obliterated_.

And it was all because of the gods.

There were moments over the past year in which Carter would ask Sadie if she ever regretted advocating this way of life, but Sadie never looked back on her decision. Oh sure, she missed Liz and Emma, but she got to see them several times since her birthday, but generally life was good.

Until now.

Sadie finally understood why the magicians believed the gods were the enemies. Not only were they unnecessary for hundreds of years and the need to suppress them ingrained in their culture for centuries, but they genuinely had reasons for it.

"Are you alright, dear?"

Sadie's instincts scrambled as they judged where the uninvited sound came from and analyzed its threat level. Next to Sadie. Dangerous.

Sitting on the bench next to the teenage magician was a young woman, dressed in a dark coat. Pale, white irises were on a book the woman was reading.

That image was through her mortal senses.

Her magical ones were screaming in pain.

The woman next to her was a _hole_. No, not a hole, but not there. The Duat simply didn't exist around her. Distortions messed up any clear sight. There weren't one, but three. Three? They all looked similar, but not quite the same. One of them looked somewhat like what her mortal senses "see." Another looked older, more ancient, more powerful, but was too distorted to interpret clearly. The last one-

"Isis?"

The goddess, presumably Isis (but Sadie never saw the goddess like this), only turned a page in a book she was reading. Then she spoke, in a complete deadpan, "It is amazing how modern archaeologists can classify us. You know, we go by different names, have slightly different interpretations, evolve, but most people like a single condensed character. But we aren't that."

Sadie didn't move. Partly out of her misery moments before, partly because of how disorientated she was, partly because she was angry. Very angry.

"How dare you show your face here now!. Can't you even give a little thought about others, like at all? Wait, you can't. That thoughtfulness is exactly why everything happened." Interestingly enough, none of the mortals in the proximity noticed the shouting girl. The goddess must have put up a ward.

The goddess Isis? tilted her head, and glanced at Sadie's normally blue eyes for a moment, and then back into her book. "Gods don't have history, not exactly. Though some of our acts are actual history, others are interpreted as such until they become history, until they become part of us. Who knows what Isis was thinking. Perhaps it was some story, just a simple one, that later became true. Maybe she actually did it. I'm not sure if even Isis knows anymore."

Sadie glared into the side of the goddess' skull. Oh, she _wished_ she had eyes that could kill. As always, the goddess was making it difficult. "Stop speaking in riddles! Talk to me!"

The goddess glanced at Sadie for a moment, before she transformed.

It was a radical change. The goddess in front of was a mystery to her senses, but now it was clearer, more familiar. Before, the goddess dressed modestly, with little makeup or jewelry. Now, it was the exact opposite. Jeweled hair, a white dress, warm brown eyes. And her face. _Ruby Kane's face_.

Sadie felt a surge of anger. Before, it Isis using her mother's face was not nearly as upsetting. After all, Ruby died before Sadie left too much of an impression of Ruby on herself. Now? She was angry. At the _thing_ impersonating her mother.

"Well?" she demanded.

The goddess as motherly as ever, somehow managed to look both concerned and untroubled. "Is something wrong, Sadie?"

Sadie didn't respond for a moment. She was too full of emotions. Rage. Anger. Helplessness. So many were swirling inside her, begging for attention, but she was unable to choose. Finally, she whispered, "Why is this happening to me?"

Isis smiled. It was a brittle smile, one that was threatening to crack at any moment. "There were times that I question the purpose of fate. We like to think that are in charge of our own actions, our own destiny, yet it always rewinds. Events happen again and again, as if we are a broken clock. Is this our fate? What did we do deserve this?"

'Because you are gods,' thought Sadie, though she didn't voice that out loud. Instead, Sadie asked something else. "Who was she?"

Isis looked uncomfortable for a brief flash, before answering, "I suppose that was close to what the Greeks would think of as my 'True Form.'"

Sadie tilted her head. She definitely heard of this "True Form" before, but the explanations were always vague. "Meaning?"

Isis frowned, " _She_ was the essence of the goddess made up of all the different personalities and forms of all the goddesses associated with deity known primarily as [Hecate] today."

Sadie tilted her head. "So you are a part of Hecate? You are not making much sense."

Isis sighed, "I suppose it wouldn't make sense to most mortals, outside the ones who specialize in interpreting myths. The simple answer is, that all stories, in one way or another, is true. Lies that are widely accepted enough become truths, part of us." The goddess looked down on her open hands, "It is just that this particular goddess had a much larger influence on a wide variety of cultures, eventually becoming what she became today."

"So are you part of Hecate?" asked Sadie.

Isis chuckled, "I see that you still don't understand. That goddess from before is essentially an amalgamation of a bunch of goddesses with a common root. I am simply one of the most influential ones of them. I am not [Hecate], but it is simpler to refer to that collective goddess as [Hecate]. Even then, we are separate, yet we are one."

At this point, Sadie gave up on trying to understand the goddess. Divinity were always infuriating on details.

"So what are you even doing here? I thought the gods have decided to distance themselves from Humanity. Why show up now?"

This time, Isis showed a semblance of seriousness on her face. The goddess transformed, back into the pale eyed version from before reading a book. "I've discovered something... troubling. Something from the past of one of my older incarnations... senses something powerful."

Sadie snorted, "What is it now? Need us to trap a god again? Defeat a magician? Apophis is rising again?"

The goddess didn't respond. She simply closed her book, and for the first time, actually faced Sadie. And for then the emotionless face cracked, literally _cracked_ like glass.

What lay behind the cracked portions of her face wasn't the pale face from before, but one much darker, as if the face was dyed by the earth itself. Pitch black eyes locked onto Sadie's tear-stained dark blue. Sadie's senses went into overdrive. That facet was much more ancient, primordial, _powerful_. Sadie's senses couldn't even tell distinguished features from the indistinct blur of a face staring at her.

Finally, the ancient goddess spoke. The voice was quite similar to how the Egyptian god of the earth Geb spoke: gravelly, like millions of pebbles shaking to produce a sound.

"I wish it were so."

* * *

 **February 14th**

It was Valentines Day.

A day that Miyu never got to experience before, and thought she never would.

She was more open to her classmates now, though she still came off as shy to them. But they didn't blame her for it. In contrast, for some reason Miyu couldn't fathom, they found that adorable about her.

She made more friends. She exchanged numbers and emails with some of them, like Cynthia Kellerman and Kimberly Oak. They were open with many people, and Miyu found herself quickly fitting into their group.

School was fun. The teachers were nice, and she quickly found herself being friendly with them, though she still felt apprehensive about the PE teacher.

Sure, Mr. Littletwig was nice, and she knew that everyone trusted him. Miyu herself had full confidence the man was harmless, and loved kids. It was just that he had a passing resemblance to someone she knew.

After school, Miyu often ventured out to meet Emily, and vice versa. It was interesting that Miyu could relate a lot with the girl. Both of them lost their parents and families, and were now forced to live a new life. They learned new things about each other, and learned several spells together, which Emily always had the upper hand in.

Anyway, school life was good. She fit in with everyone. It was fun. The homework and projects were difficult, but satisfying to finish. Life at her new home was stable and happy. Sally was a wonderful foster-mother, a term that Miyu only started using recently. As always, Paul was constantly upbeat, and helped clarify the few English terms that Miyu was unfamiliar with. Percy... well he wasn't her brother, but a good friend. As it turned out, there were multiple places in her studies in which she actually needed help in.

Life was good, but that feeling only really hit Miyu on that specific day.

Valentines Day wasn't a national holiday in the United States or Japan, but it was celebrated in both of them. It was present in almost all walks of life. For younger students, it was a day of friendship, one to share chocolate with each other. For older ones, it was a chance to experience young love. For couples, it was that golden day, a day to celebrate relationships. For the single, it was a day of hopefulness, the day when they gather their hopes and abandon their fears to ask out that one crush.

Miyu and her classmates were still in the "younger students" stage, but even that startled her.

Flowers, cards, chocolates, everywhere.

Again, another new experience for Miyu, but one thing was sure.

She was happy.

* * *

 **AN: Sorry again for being a short chapter again, and not having a lot of plot progression (relatively to the rest of the story).**

 **Let's talk about Hazel. I really liked her character and her backstory, but was disappointed by how she was incorporated into the story. So yeah, here, she turned down being a Centurion and breaking up with Frank. Why? Well, I never found her incredibly compatible with Frank, and felt their feelings were never especially strong. And including the age gap, well, sorry. Also, we never really get to take a really close look at her character and thoughts, unless if they were about her past or Leo, so forgive me if I take a few liberties with her character.**

 **So yeah, Walt's dead. Sorry if there are any fans of him out there, but it must be done. I just can't conceivably have him make some kind of miraculous recovery after the punishment already dealt to him.**

 **Oh, and Hecate showed up. This is what, the second god to actually show up in the story? Yeah, after Dionysus, who really is just a lazy freeloader. Her personality is as of yet, still unknown, so I didn't have a lot to work with. My interpretation of Hecate, or more specifically, a goddess that is a collection of several goddess that includes Hecate and Isis. Because the House of Hades' interpretation of Hecate was... unique and strange, and I wanted to incorporated parts of the Giant guarding the Doors of Death into this version of Hecate. Oh, and I had to incorporate the number 3 somewhere in her character. Tell me if I did a good job.**

 **I can't promise when the next update is going to come out, until then, please read, follow, and review. Favorite if you enjoy the story. See you guys later!**


	10. Chapter 10

**Again, I don't own these franchises. Moving on...**

* * *

 **February 25th**

Reyna, Praetor of Camp Jupiter was a leader. Some legionnaires say she was born to be one. Others, born to wealthier families, envy her success since joining the legion. Among friends and enemies, she was a figure to be treated with respect. After all, how many times have she seen the legion through difficult times? She deterred Atlas' advance into San Francisco at the Golden Gate bridge just a few weeks after she joined the legion. In the months afterward, Reyna, with the help of veteran demigods from New Rome's reserves, smashed army after army of monsters in the Bay Area. It was of little wonder the Romans raised her up to be Praetor.

Reyna Ramírez-Arellano on the other hand, was just a broken girl. Her childhood was ruined by the specter of her insane father. Her early teens wasted as a handmaiden employed by Circe. Then taken aboard a pirate ship as a slave. Her life was a continuous series of train wrecks, one disaster after another.

Through it all she had her older sister, Hylla.

Hylla was much different from her. Perhaps she was just born with more resolve, perhaps it was because Hylla remembered a more peaceful time before their father went mad. Regardless, she took care of her.

After their father's death, Hylla was the one who attracted Circe's attention. While Circe only wanted to take the older of the two, Hylla negotiated to have the younger sister to come along, though virtually as a slave.

Life on Circe's island, wasn't particularly awful, but Reyna couldn't look back on those days with joy. The sorceresses on the island never treated her poorly, perhaps because of her sister's rising reputation among the Enclave, they never tried to come particularly close to her either. The other servants didn't acknowledge her, bitter about her better treatment from her sister's performance. Even Hylla didn't interact with her much, being too washed up with her rising position on the island.

So Reyna's dull life continued. She picked up a few things while serving the sorceresses, like developing an immunity to the powers of suggestion and learning a little on how magic works, though she was likely to never gain any proficiency with any kind of spell-work. Occasionally new recruits and lost seafarers turned up on the shores, but nothing changed. She transitioned from a child into a young teen. And then _he_ came.

Perhaps the Son of Poseidon never considered that when he released the pirates, he was ruining the livelihoods of hundreds on the island. Reyna could forgive him for not realizing the consequences. But she didn't forgive him for indirectly bringing an end to her boring life.

Even now, she didn't completely forgive him. After all, holding grudges, even after generations and decades was _very_ Roman. One only had to read about Hannibal and Scipio to learn that.

Huh, maybe that was why Pluto was so much more popular than Hades.

After escaping the Pirates thanks again to Hylla, Reyna and the rest of the captives arrived on the continent with no clear objective. Some of the sorceresses wanted to head to New York, where the Enclave owned a small store. Several of the recruits entertained thoughts on joining the Greek Demigod Camp, the Handmaidens of Diana, or even the rumored armies of Saturn.

But two of the captives in the group were different from Reyna and the rest. Most of the other captives were picked up by Circe as orphans with nowhere else to go. But that wasn't always the case apparently. Apparently some of the other supernatural groups sent their girls to Circe's Enclave for training in the magical arts. One of them professed to be from a minor family from the Amazons. The other claimed to be from New Rome.

Since the two demigoddesses (or perhaps more accurately legacies, if they had divine blood at all) came from a an actual society that was built on the backs of knowledge of the supernatural, they were able to secure funds from New Rome and the Amazons to make the journey West.

There, Reyna experienced the next large turning point of her life: Hylla simply abandoning her at the train station in Sacramento.

To this day, Reyna wasn't sure exactly why Hylla decided to abruptly leave. Was she tired of taking care of Reyna? Did she simply not care anymore? Did she abandon her because she was weak?

Reyna didn't exactly have time to mope around though. The legacy from New Rome and the few other girls that chose Camp Jupiter over the Amazons had to move.

At Camp Jupiter, Reyna finally found her purpose in life, a talent in which she excelled at. Though initially taken into the 12th Legion with suspicion, she quickly found a place in the 3rd Legion through her success in war games. From there, she became Praetor in a matter of months.

Then came the next phase of her life: fighting against the Titans.

The siege of Mount Othrys, or present day Mount Tamalpais, was a long and grueling affair. Siege engines had to be constructed, ammunition had to be hemorrhaged, and even then the fortress simply refused to fall. It was a miracle that the 12th Legion of 300 campers and 400 veterans with the 500 women strong Amazon contingent were able to break the siege, topple the Titans' seats of power, and slay Krios at all. Even then, the casualties were immense. More than half of the siege force never returned home alive.

Since then, Reyna was able to fool herself into thinking perhaps now her life could be normal. She could spend her next few years rebuilding the legion, home-school herself something resembling a proper education, maybe even woo Jason, and then go to college in New Rome. Perhaps she could finally move on with her life.

But the gods were unforgiving. Reyna was once again standing alone with the 12th Legion. The hero of the legion was sent away by the gods with no apparent explanations of any kind.

And then Percy Jackson came back into her life.

Reyna really wanted to hate the Son of Neptune, but then again he ended a life at Circe's Island, a life in hindsight wasn't what Reyna wanted. There were plenty of other reasons. He was disrespectful, a bit full of himself, and seemingly unconcerned of the consequences behind his actions.

Simply put, he was unbelievably infuriating.

Kinda like Jason, but in the complete other way really.

And then after essentially staying over for a week and rising to Praetor faster than anyone ever, he essentially decided to give the middle finger to all of Rome, and leaving her with the mess of a 12th Legion completely behind war against the Greeks.

His girlfriend, Annabeth wasn't much better.

Reyna barely remembered her from Circe's Island. After all, she was simply one of the girls that she attended to. She was smarter than Percy, but still seemingly unconcerned with problems they caused.

At the very least they could have paid for the property damage _their_ flying warship inflicted on New Rome. The Romans still haven't received a proper apology.

And then the two _idiots_ told her to effectively commit political suicide and risking civil war, one of which Reyna could've still stalled against for another few months, by taking part in their harebrained idea of a quest. Worst of all, Reyna had no choice but accept.

And then when the entire mess was over, Reyna had to work with Frank Zhang as her co-Praetor.

Don't get her wrong, Frank was a plenty decent guy. He was loyal and fierce in battle.

But he had no true leadership or political experience or talent. Quests didn't exactly count as "leadership" experience. After all, when the traveling group was only three large, there usually no clear leader. Honestly, though Octavion was power hungry, he was at the very least competent, had leadership experience, and was loyal to Rome.

Frank, while he had good intentions, came from a backwater family and only a month of training at Camp Jupiter. Even Hazel would have made a much better choice, despite her heritage, with 6 months of experience.

Furthermore, his claim to Praetorship was shaky at best, and outright scandalous at worst. Percy and Jason, for all their downfalls, were at the very least elected by the Legion and proved themselves to the Legion. Frank was given emergency powers by a Praetor that was declared a traitor that turned his back on Rome during a quest several thousand miles away from the 12th Legion. Needless to say, Frank's legitimacy as Praetor was almost nonexistent.

Perhaps that was why the Empires of Europe and the Middle East were more successful than Rome in the long term. Having titles be inherited could lead to ineffective rulers, but at the very least it provided stability. Stability that the Roman Empire never really had.

6 months later, Frank graduated from "stumbling around in the dark" to "tolerant" in Reyna's eyes. He learned how to weave through politics, to command the legion, to actually listening to New Rome's Greater Republic (which was made up of adults).

Reyna's life started to look up again. New Rome was rebuilding its former power under its Golden Eagle. Relationships with the gods were stronger than ever. Their cooperation with the Greeks was starting to be fortuitous.

But then something happened again.

It started small, mere rumors. The _Lares_ , Roman ghosts whose abilities to keep their mouths shut wasn't reputable, started whispering. They whispered of Spirits and Heroes. Of Monsters and Men.

Reyna dismissed them of course, nothing but rumors. Frank wasn't as sure, but trusted the Greeks to deal with whatever situation turned up.

And then Hazel came back, panting from Shadow-traveling, and reported of an alliance in Brooklyn. Between Circe's Enclave and the House of Life.

Reyna knew of the existence of the House of Life of course, something that shocked Frank and Hazel. The library in Circe's Island cited them often in history. In fact, New Rome has a (secret) mutually beneficial relationship of exchange of materials with the 32nd Nome of San Francisco. One only known of by the higher-ups in New Rome and certain key officials.

Ever since the failed Alaska expedition, the 12th Legion was always short on material. And since Octavion's family had an effective monopoly on the creation of Imperial Gold, another way to find effective monster slaying weapons was needed. And what better seller of enchanted metal was there but the nearby group of magicians?

In fact, the 360 Nomes of the House of Life scattered across the world usually had working relationships with the locals. However, they never had straight-up alliances. Before now, they were always nuetral, never taking a side, not even against the hordes of the pit.

But it seemed that it now made an alliance with Circe. Just what was going on?

That was the reason why Reyna ordered to have Hazel transport them to the the Enclave's shop in Manhattan to find out just what was going on.

And that was how Reyna got into her current predicament.

"Percy and Annabeth never really ever mentioned you guys existed, you know?" remarked Carter Kane, who stretched out his hand in a handshake while smiling.

After visiting the thrift store, she and Hazel were guided by the staff to the First Cavalry Cemetery.

The cemetery was completely devoid of life. No cars were parked and the gates were closed. To the mortal eye, it would've seemed like there was nothing to see.

The scenery shifted once the Romans entered the cemetery. Scores of magicians and sorceresses roamed the marble slabs and pillars of the graves. The apparent ages of the participants varied. Some looked as young as 16, while others looked well into their 60s.

But Reyna knew apparent ages meant virtually nothing to those who wielded magic. Mages often lived up to twice the lifespan of a normal human. Those who augmented their body often lived much longer. Even then, those who were experienced in magic for centuries often found ways to adjust their outer appearance, so who knew who was how old? But Reyna could tell one fact despite their apparent age.

All the mages in the cemetery were immensely powerful. From the very basics of magic that Reyna was able to scrape by with told her at least that much. Hazel on the other hand, who was just starting off with learning magic with no real teacher was oblivious to the danger.

The two demigods were led to the church, or more accurately in front of the church, where a group of people were gathered around a glowing map of the surrounding area hovering in the air.

Reyna knew Circe by sight. Miranda Dawn took her a moment to actually recognize. The other five: two blacks, one older and one younger, a blonde with dyed hair, an Arabic girl, and a lady with dyed blue hair, she didn't recognize.

Hazel of course knew none of them save one.

"Hi Carter," greeted Hazel.

And so started introductions.

Reyna eyed Carter's outstretched hand and made no attempt to reach for it. "We aren't friends just yet. But about Percy and Annabeth-don't worry, they never mentioned you at all either."

Carter's smiled cracked. The blonde face palmed. The older black magician sighed in exasperation, muttering. The Arabic girl sniffed. The Circe and the mysterious sorceress with the blue hair laughed. Miranda paid no attention to the new arrivals, deciding to fine-tune the settings of the holographic map. Hazel winced.

"It's nice to see you again, Reyna," smirked Circe. The women still hasn't changed. Power flowed out of her words as she spoke, inclining all in her presence to listen to her, to follow her demands. "It's been too long."

But Reyna wasn't one of them. She was resourceful, a quick learner, and learned to ignore the sorceresses' words. "Clearly not long enough. Now tell me, what is going on here?"

* * *

Class cards, soul containers, heroes. It was an outrageous explanation. Objects which contained the souls of ancient men of power.

It was absurd. The idea that anyone could craft one in the first place. Objects containing souls weren't unheard of, but they were usually the objects of myth and legends. After all, the soul is the sacred "engine" that powers a living organism. Without one, an individual cannot be called human without one. To tear one apart to create a device like the supposed "class cards" the Egyptians and Circe told her apart would be taboo in virtually any society, either then or now.

But once done, it was feasible. After all, the mechanics of allowing, no _forcing_ the soul to possess the user to gain the soul's powers wasn't impossible. _Eidolons_ , a kind of ancient spirit, were capable of possessing a victim and using the host's skills to their full extant. Not dissimilar to what the hypothetical class card would do. So mechanically the class card Circe and Medea described would be perfectly plausible. But was it practical?

Reyna watched the mages erecting a barrier spell over the center of the cemetery, an intersection of paths, as she gathered her thoughts.

The barrier wasn't like the one to hide the supernatural activities in the cemetery, but rather to contain a powerful being that will appear. Four large statues of various deities were erected 20 meters from each other facing the cardinal directions. The various geometric shapes in the magical circle were drawn in blood to increase their potency. Magicians and Egyptians collaborated with each other to enhance the barrier's effectiveness.

For the -nth time in her life Reyna contemplated how her life would've changed if she could use magic.

After all, who hasn't as a child fantasized about being able to use a new and strange power to overcome one's obstacles? For Reyna, that fantasy was reinforced by the existence of the supernatural. Even now she wondered. Could she use her imaginary power to make a better life for herself? Perhaps save more legionnaires during the Siege of Mt. Othrys? The possibilities were endless.

But for Reyna that fantasy was quickly squashed. The existence of a world of magic, gods, and monsters was nothing to yearn for. For even if you had power, something you were not likely to have even if you were involved, the world was full of monsters that could crush you underfoot. Beings so old that they cared nothing for humans. Other humans who towered over others.

After all, though demigods capable of wielding the elements or possessed other special boons from their lineage were well known, more often than not most demigods, even those born from the Olympian Gods, were born with none of the advantages of divine blood. Only the disadvantages of both the mortal and supernatural worlds.

Reyna glanced at Carter and Sadie Kane. Apparently they only discovered the existence of the supernatural less than two years ago. Since then, they have risen to become powerful mages, at least in combat.

Carter was well built for a teenager his age. He was no Frank or Jason, but he was decently in shape. He was obviously wading through unknown waters, but seemed confident. Reyna could tell there was some serious power located in that suitcase he carried with him. But what kind evades her senses.

Sadie on the other hand seemed much duller than others made her out to be. Oh, Reyna knew that the girl was capable of advanced magic from what the others told her, but she always seemed to be distracted by something else. Perhaps something happened to her recently?

Regardless, they were the lucky ones. Those prodigies who had their lives laid down before them by the fates before they even try. Oh, Reyna knew the effort they put through to get where they were, but she couldn't help but feel a little resentful. After all, it seemed they haven't faced the true horrors of the world yet. Sure, they "saved" the world, but they knew little of conflicts which the Greeks and Romans went through. They wandered into the supernatural late, and haven't seen what those introduced to it at birth like Reyna or most of the Romans have.

She then glanced to the women with the partially blue hair.

Apparently her true identity was Medea, the Witch of Colchis from the tale of Jason and Argonauts. Most accounts of the witch weren't positive, and from what Reyna has heard about her since the rising of Gaia, her actions since her reincarnation weren't pleasant. But so far she led no action to lead Reyna to think of her as an enemy. A threat? Definitely, but Reyna would tolerate her. For now.

"It looks like you have done this many times," Reyna remarked.

"We have had centuries of experience in capturing the gods," replied Amos Kane. Unlike the Kane siblings, this elder Kane was clearly in familiar territory. The unique leopard skin cape singled him out from every magician as the Chief Lector of the House of Life. "Defeating the gods is nothing simple. After all, a single deity could overpower hundreds of magicians. So we developed certain strategies to combat them." The man paused, and spoke pointedly to the Kane siblings and the Arabic girl, now named as Zia, "Single combat with gods are _not encouraged._ "

Sadie turned her head and muttered something indecipherable.

"Why do you guys think this 'class card' will appear here?" asked Reyna.

This time it was Miranda who responded, "We don't." Still staring at the hovering map in front of her, she continued, "But we do know that there _is_ something right there. Something that wasn't here two months ago. The presence has been significantly growing for the past few days, and if our calculations are correct, it should've appeared by sundown."

Reyna eyed the twilight horizon. The sun had long passed below it. "Maybe you should reconsider your evaluation."

Carter shrugged, "Well, Miranda is right: there _is_ something there. And it is growing stronger. It is this black murky thing in the Duat. However, whenever we try to get closer to it, we are stopped by this invisible wall."

Reyna thought about the situation for a moment, and opened her mouth to speak-

 _ **CLINK**_

All eyes were turned to the barrier set up. In it, distinct among the white pavement and the surrounding grass was a literal crack in the air.

 _ **CLINKCLINK**_

Instantly, Reyna and Hazel drew their respective weapons, a _pilum_ and a Roman cavalry sword. The Egyptians not supporting the barrier whipped out their staves and rods. Carter, interestingly enough, took up two decorated, but oddly shaped sticks. The sorceresses in the graveyard prepared their various foci.

As every armed themselves, Reyna took the time after preparing to study the anomaly. The crack wasn't huge. In fact, it was just the size of a golf ball, but was growing larger and larger with ever passing second. The dark blue of the world behind the crack was a stark contrast with the vibrant colors of reality.

 _ **CRASH**_

Reyna would later say that she, along with all the younger participants absolutely did not flinch. Older participants wouldn't blame them. The sight, while not exactly horrifying, wasn't pleasant.

A long black arm reached out from the crack, pointed skywards. The arm flailed in the air for a second before stilling.

 _ **BAMCRASHKABAM**_

And the arm doubled back on itself, gripping the edges of the fabric of reality and _pulled-_

 _ **SMASH**_

And the crack doubled in size, then tripled, then grew large enough for a grown man to climb through.

The arm was joined by another, and both of them pulled the being whom they belonged to from the void.

The being wasn't grotesque, but rather humanoid, yet Reyna couldn't identify it as the same species as her. The Mist swirling around the figure didn't help.

"What is that _thing_?" snarled Zia in disgust.

The being wore no shirt, instead choosing to go with only a black rag tied around his waist. His entire body was black; his clothes, skin, everything; save for one feature: his mask.

The mask wouldn't have been out of place during Halloween: A white skull positioned over his face. But in February, it looked completely out of place. And in late winter, the white skull mask made the figure look even more menacing.

And the moment it pulled itself out of the void, it dropped to the ground like a sack of potatoes, the crack in reality closing behind it.

"Is that it?" asked Hazel.

The other mages supporting the barrier obviously were having the same thoughts, but Amos snapped them back into attention, "Don't let up!"

True to Amos' words, the being picked itself back up and glanced at its surroundings. Reyna wondered what it was thinking. Was it like Basilisks or Hellhounds, which only had a primitive intelligence and instinct to work off of? Or did it possess the intelligence of where it was?

Any semblance of the being having intelligence were thrown out the window when it charged into the barrier at a mind-boggling speed, and was promptly blocked and thrown back to the ground.

Even then, the force behind the monster was strong enough to have several of the magicians supporting it to stumble, the barrier literally vibrating from the shockwave. Reyna even observed a large crack appearing in the Mist, a testament of the being's strength.

The monster stood up again, and started attacking the barrier again. Spellcasters around the graveyard rushed to help reinforcing the barrier. After a few minutes, the cracks on the barrier gradually fixed themselves faster than the monster inside could create them. Soon enough, none of the monster's attacks did any damage.

"So," said Circe, "This is 'Assassin,' right?" Medea nodded. "I'm not impressed."

"With all due respect Aunt, the Assassin class card is supposed to be the weakest," replied Medea, "but it is supposed to have some special ability."

The class card stood up, and then in front of everyone's eyes, _multiplied_. Suddenly there were 10 of them. Then 20. Then well over several dozen.

None of the "copies" were identical. Rather, each and every one of them were unique. Several of them shared the same body type, but most of them deviated from that. Some were far larger than others. Several were small, one as small as a child. Around half of them were female. All of them shared the black skin and clothing, with a white skull mask.

"Interesting," said Circe. "I am curious to see just what this ability is. Illusions perhaps?"

As if to answer her question, the "class card" charged the barrier again, but now split into many different facets, the beings hit the barriers on all sides.

Unlike before, where the class card was able to ever so slightly damage the magical barrier, the many beings didn't seem to majorly affect the barriers at all. They punched, kicked, and with various blackened weapons even attempted to cut or stab through the shield. Behind said shield, the various spellcasters desperately tried to keep up with the barrier. But the beings slashed quickly, easily a match to any trained demigod. Honestly, the mob that made up the class card could take on two of her Cohorts. Sowly, the barrier started to thin.

This sort of power...frightened Reyna. After all, Assassin was supposedly the weakest class card, yet it was this powerful? That sort of power got you onto high places. It would get you ancient families in New Rome offering adoption into their families, treasure hunters from every corner of the continent looking for it, maybe even powerful enough for gods to look into. And if Assassin was the weakest, what about the purportedly stronger ones?

Suddenly the affair, which Reyna thought over the top, made sense. If the class cards were so powerful, it only made sense that no expense was spared to neutralize the threat.

The other parties realized it too.

Hazel only stared at the shapes with a disturbed look on her face. Reyna didn't blame her. While she went through several very intense quests, Reyna doubted Hazel faced anything quite like the Assassin class card.

Sadie looked on in shock, almost dropping her wand and staff watching the class card. Carter on the other hand only gripped his chosen weapons, the oddly shaped sticks harder. Zia's staff burst into flames, though it didn't hide the girl's shaking. Amos Kane unlike his kin only stared on, not responding in any meaningful way. The other magicians, like Amos, had a deceptive aura of calm while keeping up with their reinforcement spells.

The sorceresses on the other hand took the situation very differently. Several of them remained stoic in the face of the abomination, continuing to provide the Boundary Field with magic. Some, which Reyna identified as relatively new or have never been in combat were clearly disoriented by the appearance of the class card, were struggling to keep up with their spells. The three with her?

Well, Miranda dispelled the map she previously had with her, and was now furiously typing into a tablet she carried in her hands, occasionally glancing up, only to type a few more lines of notes. Medea stood tall and straight, her mismatched blue and brown eyes scanning the Assassin class card. Her fingers twitched, as if itching to cast a spell, but she restrained any such action. Circe, the oldest out of everyone in the graveyard, seemed almost bored.

"Honestly, I was expecting more," Circe proclaimed. "When I heard about these relics from my dear niece, she made it seem that these would revolutionized the world." Circe sharply turned her head to face Medea, a stern look on her face. To her credit, Medea didn't flinch at all, but merely smiled.

The smile worried Reyna, made her want to run away from the witch. After all, unlike Reyna, which every death in her hands were of accidents and necessity, Medea was nothing like that. Every one of her carefully planned kills and murders were done with the utmost of murderous intentions. After all, wasn't this the woman who not only killed her own brother, but chop him up in many pieces so that their pursuers had to slow down to retrieve every piece? The one who murdered her own children? The one who attempted to murder Theseus?

While the smile instilled a sense of unease in all the younger members of the crowd, Circe simply sighed. "I hope the 'Saber' and 'Lancer' cards are more impressive. Frankly, this encounter is simply... boring."

It wasn't an incorrect statement. By now, most of the younger sorceresses and magicians have recovered from the class card's initial appearance and multiplication ability, and were now imparting their efforts wholeheartedly. Instead of the barrier steadily losing ground against the horde of darkness, the barrier was now the one gaining strength with every passing second. The mob of assassins now had no hope of breaking out.

Compared to how ferocious the class card seemed before, it now looked very tame. Like a bug struggling against the wall of a jar of glass, ignorant of how pointless it was.

"I can dispose of it, if it isn't to your liking, Auntie," said Medea, her entire frame lighting up in a faint blue color. In that moment, Reyna's magical senses went into overdrive.

Before, Medea's aura of power was similar to a very strong demigod, roughly on Percy's or Jason's level. That alone indicated how dangerous the ancient sorceress was. Demigods on that level only arrived a few times every decade.

Demigods like them were akin to walking natural disasters: if rumors were to be believed, Percy was single-handedly responsible for storms, tidal waves, even volcanic eruptions. If regular demigods usually stood above mortal men, then demigods like Jason and Percy stood even taller than them.

But spellcasters on even Miranda's level usually stood even taller than most demigods. After all, they usually lived much longer than them: most demigods only lived up to the natural age expectancy, if they weren't cut down at any point sooner. The most powerful of spellcasters measured their ages in centuries. In myths, heroes usually only trumped spellcasters with special items that could counteract magic or took advantage of their limited physical prowess. But even that small advantage was diminishing: while back in the Classical period, they usually forfeited their physical abilities in exchange for their magical prowess, most modern spellcasters exercised and took some lessons in basic combat.

After all, Hylla's ability to fight didn't come out of nowhere.

But since Medea's aura was similar to Jason's, and Jason did survive their encounter during his quest in Camp Half-Blood, Reyna expected them to be of a similar level. But now Medea's aura filled the graveyard.

Most of the older magicians and sorceresses who previously stood firm in their fight against the deterioration of their domed shaped barrier now turned their head and gawked at the ancient's power. The Kane siblings were very visibly shaken by the exertion of power, wide-eyed and ready to bolt. Amos Kane remained a sea of calm, but a flicker of worry betrayed his face. Miranda was very much the same. Zia didn't seem to know how to react, only staring wide-eyed at the human shaped mass of energy standing a few meters away from her. Circe was merely resigned.

Reyna wanted to slap herself for not realizing it sooner. Medea likely stood heads above heels among other spellcasters. When she was serious, even Jason and Percy likely stood no chance, without perhaps another decade of training and a variety of magical items. After all, she was of such renown and ability that her feats were labeled into legend itself. If not for her, the Argonauts never would have finished their quest. And it was her that removed Hera's induced madness on Heracles. Any spellcaster capable of fending off the greatest Greek Hero and undoing a curse imposed by an Olympian Goddess likely placed her well above regular spellcasters.

And according to Piper, Medea apparently foresaw Gaia's eventually rise, and conspired to join the protogenoi while being a ghost in the underworld. That alone spoke volumes of her abilities.

It reminded Reyna of the absurdity of the mythological world. Why was it that demigods like herself had to be the ones to stick their necks in for the Olympians. After all, they were perfectly capable of handling their own conflicts, so why do their children have to take the responsibilities over them? According to the Seven of the Great Prophecy, when the gods did arrive, they put down the Gigantomachy so easily it was debatable whether or not they were that much of a threat in the first place.

Hazel seemed to be aware of the difference as well. Reyna knew that the girl's mother was apparently a small time practitioner of fortunes who inadvertently summoned the Roman God of the Underworld, and Hazel even started practicing magic in her spare time, but it was clear that she never really encountered pure power like what Medea was emitting.

Only Circe remained unaffected by Medea's display of power. It made sense, after all, wasn't Circe the mythical teacher of Medea? And unlike Medea, she had literal millennia to train and hone her sorcery. After all, she was a sorceress so powerful that others sometimes mistake her as a goddess rather than the demigod she was. The number of magic users that were on the same level as her in the world who weren't gods likely numbered in the single digits.

"Get that hideous thing out of my sight," declared the ancient sorceress.

Medea's immediate acknowledgement of her teacher's command was to raise a delicate hand decorated with blue nail polish with her palm raised up- before she closed her fist, as if crushing something.

In that moment, the already enormous pressure in the atmosphere doubled, and every spellcaster in the vicinity, barring Circe of course, all collectively winced at the spike of magical energy to their senses.

In that moment, the ground beneath the circular dome surrounding cracked, and then collapsed in a dome shape that made the area beneath the barrier concave. The mobs of black assassins didn't escape the spell. They were forced to heel by it. And then their arms gave up the futile struggle against gravity and let their body be pressed upon the ground. Even then, the bodies still struggled uselessly under the enhanced gravity of Medea's spell.

And then one by one the assassins started disappearing. At first Reyna thought that the gravity spell was killing the different wraiths one by one, but once they started disappearing _en_ _mass_ did Reyna recognize what was actually going on.

The assassins weren't disappearing, they were recombining.

When the last duplicate disappeared, only the original, the one which crawled out of the hole in reality, remained. It laid down in the middle of the dome, still. And then a raised an arm. The arm faltered against the ever enhancing gravity that Medea projected, and came down, palm against the cracked pavement. Another arm rose, and joined its brother. The pair of arms pushed against the gravity, and despite all odds, the body rose. A leg was picked up, until the assassin was kneeling.

And then it finally stood straight up, still feeling the effects of the pressure placed upon it by Medea.

It took a step, and then another, and yet another at an accelerated pace, though the effects of the spell were clear. It approached the barrier, and then-

"Ατλας,"

As the reincarnated sorceress spoke those words, Reyna vaguely translated the Ancient Greek into the English. Atlas. The Titan which held up the sky. The greatest of the Titan warriors. The Titan trapped by its burden of the vast expanse of blue.

The incantation was fitting. Just before Assassin was able to touch the barrier, it seemed as if time inside the the barrier simply froze. The class card wasn't the only object incapable of moving: several spellcasters within a few meter's distance from the Boundary Field found themselves incapable of any movement. Some of them managed to escape the spell. The majority didn't.

They were all trapped by this seemingly simple spell.

The spell was very dispiriting to Reyna. An enemy caught it in would find himself unable to escape, permitted only to move at their enemy's leisure. Watching the class card continue to struggle against the spell was downright depressing.

It seemed that Amos thought the same. With a sigh, he raised his staff, and casted a spell, "Ha-Di."

The words were unfamiliar to Reyna, but what it meant spoke for themselves.

A set of hieroglyphics appeared on the ground beneath where the Assassin stood. A moment later, the symbols flared in a bright, crimson red and exploded. There was no flames, no smoke like the bombs and explosives Reyna would witness from Greek Fire and the siege engines New Rome held for training. The explosion was instead a pure shock wave of Kinetic Energy emanating from the blood red runes on the pavement.

The effects were absolutely devastating.

The shock wave tore through the class card, which stood on the epicenter of the blast. The class card was swept away by the force, the magical energy that made up Assassin instantly dispersing with only a brown card floating briefly in the air where the class card once stood before dropping to the ground.

The spell didn't stop with the class card. The shock wave continued and hit the barrier that was no longer supported by the spellcasters who were all too mesmerized by Medea's display of magical prowess.

The barrier that stopped the hideously strong Assassin's attacks cracked, and then was blown apart, the pavement and ground where it stood torn apart by the sudden dispersal of the magical energy reinforcing the barrier.

When the dust cleared, the results were plain to see. A depression of crushed pavement and dirt 20 meters wide stood at the crossing of paths. The 4 statues of Egyptian deities that Reyna supposed supported the barrier were all knocked down by Amos' spell. Torn up earth surrounded the barrier.

The Kane siblings looked a bit surprised at their relative's skill in magic. The sorceresses looked impressed. Zia seemed to regard the Chief Lector's display of power as ordinary.

And Reyna and Hazel? They were shaken. Very much so.

* * *

 **Had writers block. This is literally my third version of the Chapter. Had a storyboard, but problems with how to implement it.**

 **In the end, this chapter was the result. I'm not totally satisfied with it, but I doubt I can come up with something better for quite a while.**

 **Well, the focus of this chapter was Reyna. I love her character, but felt like she wasn't given enough backstory. We know who her family was. We know she was an attendant on Circe's Island. We know she arrived at Camp Jupiter and served for 4 years, somehow becoming Praetor in the process. Went to Charleston at some point, and talked to Venice for some reason. But that was kinda it. For a character that is honestly the only reason I was able to sit through the 4th and 5th installments of HoO, she feels underdeveloped. Well, it was interesting writing as her.**

 **I was considering doing the same for Hylla and the Amazons, literally got half a chapter of backstory for them ready, but it simply wouldn't have worked in the fic.**

 **And as always, please review when you finish reading, and feel free to ask questions. Just no more "is _ going to show up and going to use the _ card." questions. Make no mistake, class card will be used by demigods, but which ones will be a secret.**

 **Until next time.**


	11. Chapter 11

**I own nothing in this fic, not the Nasuverse nor the Riordanverse. They are owned by Nasu and Riordan respectfully.**

* * *

 **March 5th**

It amazed Miyu that how much things could change in two months.

 **vwooom. vwooom. VWOOOM. KSH KSH KSH KSH. vwoooooooooom**

A few scant months ago, Miyu would've never had thought she would be able to experience the world she was in with her own two eyes.

 **WWWRRRREEEEAAAAAUUUUUUGGGHHHH**

It was likely not even her brother had ever experienced some of the stuff she had seen, despite his travels across the globe and age.

 **Oo-bah. Oo-bah.**

It was all more reason to thank her brother for this opportunity.

* * *

"So how did you like it?" asked Percy as he and his adopted sister stepped off the cab and back onto the street after going to the theater.

"I found the plot, compelling, and this 'force' is similar to manipulating the Mist to create illusions and alter reality." Miyu turned her head to look up at her adopted brother. "Perhaps the Force was inspired by the supernatural?"

Percy chuckled, "I don't think so. As far as I know, George Lucas is just a regular guy. While it might be true that many famous people in history were demigods, there are yet many who weren't."

Miyu blinked. She was aware of differences between her original world and the one she currently inhabited, and was fascinated by how many figures in history were apparently of supernatural origin. "Like who?"

Percy slowed down his pace and thought for a moment before answering, "I've heard rumors that Steve Jobs was actually a son of Hermes, or maybe a legacy of Athena. It would make sense, given that he was abandoned at an orphanage by his parents. However, Bill Gates is completely mundane. I heard that he is aware of the supernatural - his company's headquarters are in Amazon territory after all, but all tests confirm he has no special lineage whatsoever."

As Percy pressed the doorbell to their apartment, Miyu considered the thought. "I see." After all, there were too many significant human beings at any given moment in time for all of them to be affiliated with the supernatural. Apparently George Washington was a son of Athena, but he wasn't the only founding father, albeit being arguably the most important one. From what she understood, most Roman demigods kept to themselves, only playing a significant role in the affairs of the outside world when it suited them. The same was true for Legacies of both sides. Descendants who were separate from the main camps of the Greco-Roman world who were aware of their divine ancestry apparently cared little about them, kept to themselves, not unlike what Percy had said about his friend Frank.

Percy's mother was never one to keep her children waiting. As usual, she opened the door with only a moment passing since Percy rang the doorbell. "Welcome back," Sally said while smiling that usual smile of hers that made Miyu feel warm in her chest in a way she only ever felt with one other person. "How was the movie?"

"It was really good mom," replied Percy easily. "I really enjoyed it. It was like watching the _prequels_ again." Miyu caught the teen's smirk, while Sally's face darkened for a moment before reverting back to her usual smile. She wondered why the word 'prequel' seemed to be almost a dirty word among the new family.

"Is that so?" asked Sally while allowing the children to enter. "Maybe we should watch them again. As a family. All _four_ of us, and then judge then? Hmmm, Paul won't be back from his conference meeting in Albany for a while, so that might have to wait."

Percy just laughed at his mother's response, but there was no hostility, but rather an indication they were bonding through familial affections.

Miyu had wondered if she had ever been that close to her own family, both biological and adopted. Her brother claimed that her first family loved her, but she had misgivings. After all, she barely remembered anything before meeting him. What wasn't to say her family didn't take advantage of her powers? After all, the bounded field was reportedly to keep the wishes of humanity out, but who wasn't to say the purpose of the bounded field was to keep wishes _in_? It was a terrifying thought. Wish granting devices in literature such as _Arabian Nights_ and _The Monkey's Paw_ , while showing the virtues of good, all too often also displayed human beings' other nature in the face of power.

And what of her first adoptive family? Though she knew her brother sacrificed much for her, as she would for him, what would her adoptive father do? Miyu didn't exactly understand whatever his goals were, as he died before Miyu could really understand him, but since her capture by the Ainsworths, looking back, there were several moments where she remembered her adoptive father looking at her as if there was something wrong about her.

But what of Jackson-Blofis? They seemingly were the perfect example of an American family. A perfect mother that was a novelist that still helped out at the old candy store. A father who was a high school teacher educating the latest generation. A son who respects his parents and has a clear goal in his future. And now her, the adopted little sister that everyone loved.

Her new family was _perfect_. So very, very different from her old life.

"Oh," remarked Sally as she led the children into the apartment. "A guest came in for you guys while you are gone by the way."

A guest? Who...

As Miyu and Percy turned the corner, they saw...

"Medea?" said Percy in surprise.

Unlike before, where she wore a dark coat, the Witch of Treachery this time picked lighter colors. She wore a modest white turtleneck with a set of beige colored pants. She still retained some elements of her former royal status in the form of her usual golden earrings and necklaces, but otherwise, in clothing anyway, she looked no different from a regular woman.

Her other features betrayed her clothing choice. Black and indigo clashed there, if not in color then at least in spirit. In her hair, her eyes, in her posture and facial expressions, and even in Miyu's detection of prana there seemed to be two opposing sides in her body, fighting for dominance. Her magical presence hummed in the air, even greater than when they first met at the mansion.

And yet, she was drinking coffee from a blue mug while sitting in the Jackson-Blofis living room on a couch reading the morning's newspaper. It felt surreal to see the witch like that. But then again, as Miyu reflected, all humans were human, no matter how inhuman they were. Even if according to legend they were psychotic woman who was so crazy in love that she committed murder, treason, and fratricide for. Right?

 _But she knows what I am_ , a treacherous part of Miyu's mind thought.

Or at the very least Medea knew something about Miyu. Something that made her laugh as if she was mad. Mad enough to not only entrust Miyu with the Caster-class card, but to also convince everyone else to let her keep it. The class cards were likely invaluable artifacts in this world. By the rules of her own world, they would be locked in a vault and studied on. Miyu had no disillusion that similar groups were likely to do the same in this new world.

But how much did Medea know about her? Likely little, and that was the strange thing about the World's Mysteries. They were just replications of existing mysteries. But what of something that approaches Miracles like Miyu? Something that could create new ones that had never existed before? Why, that kind of power would be the dream, a Holy Grail for any magi back in her own world. That likely held true in this world as well. Medea was likely one of the closest beings to a true wielder of True Magic. However, though she was likely one of the most powerful mortals in the world, there will always be a metaphysical barrier blocking her from advancing, a barrier the ancient witch was likely very close to.

But the witch likely knew _something_. Something that made the witch make irrational decisions to the uninformed. And unfortunately for Miyu, even the littlest inclination about Miyu's true nature might just convince the witch to emulate what the Ainsworth did to her.

Percy's reaction on the other hand was far more direct. Upon laying his eye on the witch, the son of Poseidon immediately drew Riptide and a bronze shield and pushed ahead of Sally, with the shield covering his family behind him in a protective manner. "Mom, Miyu, run."

And like that, Percy charged at the witch, sword poised to slash his enemy in a wide arc.

At that moment, Miyu was reminded of the Percy's almost ridiculous physical ability. It seemed that it only took Percy an eighth of a second to reach Medea. So quickly that he almost seemed like a blur. His slash was a good clean one, one that would bisect the witch from her waist.

Or that would be the case, if an invisible wall didn't repel Percy back to where Sally and Miyu stood right before his strike would've struck home. Percy got up to attempt a second attack, if it wasn't for the firm hand clasped to his shoulder.

It was Sally, who was also holding Miyu's hand.

"Mom?" Percy asked, in confusion, until a thought struck him, and his eyes widened.

Turning back to the witch Percy pointed his sword at the witch, "You did something to her, didn't you, turn her back!"

Medea looked bemused at the teen's outburst, before turning her head...and looking at Sally? "He's impulsive isn't he?"

"He has a good heart," Sally replied, "And I daresay he didn't have a lot of good experiences with magic." Sally said that last bit with a pointed look at Medea.

Medea sighed, "I suppose my aunt never really does leave a great first impression. She was always far too fond of her transformation magics. But then again, she didn't set his home on fire at the very least."

At that moment, Percy let out a confused but still wary, "What's going on?"

* * *

"I swear on the River Styx that I will not harm anyone in this building before I leave."

As Medea said those words, thunder boomed, signaling the pact that was just sworn.

"Will you listen to what I say now?" asked Medea, smirking.

Percy, sitting opposite from the witch on the couch gave a stiff nod, though Miyu couldn't help but notice how Percy's right hand couldn't stop twitching, despite the witch's oath. Miyu herself sat next to Percy, trying to not catch the witch's mismatched eyes. Neither of them spoke. Sally, noticing the tension, went to make some cookies for the group.

"Going for the silent treatment, now, are you?" said the witch after a moment's silence.

It was Percy who responded, "Why should we trust you?"

Medea frowned, "Have I ever gave you reason to not trust me?"

Percy glared, "You killed your brother, betrayed your father, murdered your husband's new wife, your children, and attempted to assassinate Theseus. You conspired with Gaia, broke the laws of the dead, and controlled the wind spirits. And you attempted to kill my friends. Those are reasons enough."

"I was under the influence of Aphrodite for the first three, so you can't point all those fingers at me. As for my children, those were slander against me. As again for Theseus, I was attempting to dispose of a fraud trying to usurp the throne, and looking at what Theseus did with it, am I not justified?" said Medea as she defended herself. Then she brought her hand up to her face in a thoughtful gesture, "I did try to kill your friends didn't I? But then again, you're not much better. How many deaths have you caused in your pursuit of prophecies and servitude for the gods? What I did was no different. As for coming to the land of the living, if that's an argument, what about Hazel Levesque? She died decades ago, yet the gods _approve_. How was that just?"

Percy flinched at Medea's later points, but hardened his face. "No, but we are trying to be. The gods may not be always right, but they can change. We are learning from our mistakes. We are being more inclusive. Things are going to be better now."

Medea looked down, sighing and said, "Typical, Jackson, typical." She tilted her head up, and _looked_ , really looked Jackson in the eye with a gaze of blue and brown. "Do you know what I hate about heroes?"

Percy looked perplex. He shook his head.

"Well," said Medea, "I hate them for being so damn _heroic_."

She let that hang for a while. It was Miyu who responded, "What do you mean?"

For the first time in the conversation, Medea faced Miyu. Again, Miyu had the distinct impression that she was being read closer than any magazine or book. It felt extremely intrusive, but Medea used no spell, no magecraft. The witch just observed the girl's facial expression, and somehow Medea was able to derive the information she wanted from it.

Finally, Medea spoke, to the both of them, "Tell me, what do you think of Jason? And not the one in this time, but the one back in mine?"

Miyu blinked. "He was son of Aeson, rightful king of Iolcos. His uncle Pelias slew his father, and sent him to retrieve the Golden Fleece if he wanted the throne back. So Jason, with the blessing of Hera, built the Argo, collected heroes willing to aid him on his quest, and set sail for Colchis. At Colchis, the King ordered Jason to do three impossible tasks in exchange for the Fleece. Hera, knowing that Jason will not succeed without aid, conspired with Aphrodite to charm Medea, the Princess of Colchis into loving Jason. With Medea's help, Jason completed all three tasks, and seized the Golden Fleece. He later returns to Iolcus, but gets driven out. Later, he agrees to marry the Princess of Corinth, which Medea and Hera never forgave. After reclaiming the throne of Iolcus for his son Thessalus, Jason dies alone and unhappy from a piece of timber from the rotting Argo."

Medea and Percy both stared at Miyu. Did she do something wrong? Miyu knew at some level that her long monologues drew attention, but it was uncommon for the stares to be uncomfortable.

Percy shrugged, "I was never good with myths, so I only got a gist of it. I never really thought all that hard about Jason anyway."

Medea starred long and hard at Percy, "What I meant is that Heroes, at least in my experience never think about others. They think only of themselves, or more accurately, each other. The rest of the world could go to hell for all they care as long as they get what they wanted."

Percy glared back, "That is not true."

Medea snorted, "You of all heroes have no right to say that. Your existence alone has been the cause of virtually every single problem in the Greco-Roman pantheon since your birth. You automatically assume that your viewpoint is correct and don't consider others. You claim friendship when convenient but don't follow up on your end of the deal. You are selfish, thinking of yourself above others. Isn't that right, _Perseus Jackson_."

Percy looked as if to retort as Medea spoke, but as the accusations mounted, he paused and sat silent, to Miyu's surprise. Was Miyu's interpretation of Percy incorrect? Percy was nothing but caring the last few months to Miyu though. Miyu opened her mouth to defend Percy, but Percy spoke first.

"You are right." Miyu and Medea were both startled by Percy's response, expecting something different from the demigod. "You are right," said Percy, "I often didn't think very much of the individuals around me. I couldn't have cared less about my father, Camp Half-Blood, or the gods. I was in on it only for myself."

It utterly shocked Miyu, the way he delivered his message. Was Percy always like this? Was the face he showed the world just that, a show?

"But," Percy said, looking Medea in the eye, "I've recognized this and I am trying to change. I know that I am not going to do a good job at this, heck, I am probably going to do a horrible job at it, but I am trying to recognize and assess how my actions will affect others, and guide them to benefit all parties."

Medea stared at Percy, shocked, before laughing. It wasn't a laughter of joy, Miyu noticed, but of one mocking the absurdness of the world, and from Medea's legend, it suited her. "Well," said Medea, "You are much different from what I expected. I'll give you that, Percy."

The witch straightened up in her seat, setting a serious look on her face again. She reached into her pocket and pulled something out. She set it on the table.

Miyu and Percy stared. On the table, there rested a card not dissimilar from the one she kept in Miyu's pocket.

Assassin

 _Assassin_

 **ASSASSIN**

Miyu's mind blurred. When did she retrieve it? Did the card possess someone again? How did she retrieve it?

Percy on the other hand looked only curious. Picking the card up, he flipped it over, examining both sides. "Okay I'll bite, what is it?"

"Well, from our knowledge, these cards are supposed to contain copies of a soul of a powerful human from the distant past and enable a n individual to access that person's power," answered the witch while sipping from her coffee. "But this one is weird," finished Medea after setting her coffee back on the table.

Percy tilted his head, "In what way?"

Medea paused for a moment before answering, "Well, I suppose the best way is just to show you."

Percy was confused. "Use this? What do you mean?"

Medea chuckled, "Why don't you ask Miyu?"

At that statement, Percy turned to look at Miyu, who couldn't quite look at her adoptive brother directly. Should she have told him that she knew about them? How they came with her? She didn't want to though. It was supposed to be a new life for her, but then those cards came along. Slowly, she raised her head to look Percy in the eye.

What awaited her wasn't disappointment, anger, or even distrust. Percy's eyes shone with... Sadness? Understanding? Miyu opened her mouth to say something, anything to break the silence, but was interrupted by Percy bringing up a hand to silence her.

"It's okay," spoke Percy. Miyu blinked in confusion. "You're a good kid, Miyu. I'll trust you in this," said Percy. "Just tell me when you're ready okay?"

Just...just what was Miyu supposed to do with that statement? He wasn't suspicious of her, even though he had every right to? Was there a hidden meaning behind Percy's statement? Was he advocating for her to say it, or telling Miyu that it was okay for her to keep her secrets? Miyu glanced at Percy, who kept a knowing look. She then looked at Medea, who just seemed amused at the entire situation.

Miyu hesitated, before shutting her eyes and pulling out her respective Class Card and placing it next to the card that Medea provided.

The two tarot cards looked very much alike. A medieval looking portrait with a picture of a figure with a word emblazoned under it. Fancy geometric designs, only slight darker or lighter against the card's background, which varied slightly in shades of brown, framed the portraits, but beyond a cosmetic choice, Miyu couldn't identify any clear symbolism to it.

Percy picked up the Caster card and held both tarot cards to his face, examining them up close. "So, how do we use these cards?" Percy asked.

"Put down one of the cards on the table," said Medea, with Percy reciprocating. "Now say 'Class Card,' the word on the card, and then say 'Include.'"

"Class Card Caster Include."

Unlike an install, the effects of an include weren't as dramatic. There was no flash, no sound effects like Miyu seen from TV in the few times she found the time to turn on the television. The card in Percy's hand simply shimmered and grew into a very fancy looking dagger.

It was no ordinary dagger. Anyone who laid their eyes on it could tell. The blade was impractically shaped and dull except on the point, making it utterly impractical for combat. But that was of no consequence. After all, it was a Noble Phantasm, a fact that Miyu identified immediately just from the presence of the weapon, no matter how degraded the presence the dagger had in comparison to _Crocea Mors_ back at Camp Half-Blood.

Miyu wasn't the only one to notice the nature of the dagger. "This is," started a startled Percy, before calming down. "Is this a symbol of power?" the demigod wondered turning the weapon around to examine it.

Symbols of Power. From what Miyu could gather from the brief references the demigods and magicians at the 22nd Nome made, it was essentially a Divine Mystery of great relevance to a Deity in this world. Prominent examples included not only weapons like Poseidon's Trident and Thor's Mjolnir, but also other objects, like Apollo's Sun Chariot and some cases the term is expanded to include objects that Miyu suspected to be Noble Phantasms like Percy's _Anaklumos_.

"Not quite," Medea corrected. "It seems to be a reproduction of an actual relic from my day."

Miyu let out a short gasp, but Medea ignored the gasp, deigning instead to take another sip of coffee.

Percy only kept examining the dagger, but made sure not to touch the blade. A smart move, thought Miyu. But she had a hunch.

"That...dagger, it belonged to you, didn't it?" asked Miyu.

Medea didn't speak, and neither did Percy who kept his eyes on Medea, but still with no clear connection from the dagger to the witch sitting in front of him. Miyu just kept staring at Medea after her question, daring the witch to answer. It was to that scene that Sally Blofis walked into with a batch of cookies.

"Is everything alright?" asked Sally worriedly as she set down the cookies on the coffee table.

"Yes, everything is alright, Mrs. Blofis," Medea said as she tried one of the blue chocolate chip cookies. As she bit into them, her face into delighted surprise. "I must say, I haven't tasted cookies like these before. Would you mind giving me the recipe?"

Sally laughed, "Chef's secret. If you guys need me for anything, I'll be in the next room."

As Sally Blofis left the room, Medea sighed, "Your mother really is something special. Not just as a mother, but as a person as well." Medea seemed almost wistful when she said that.

Percy cleared his throat, "So did this knife belong to you?"

Medea shrugged, "Well, that's the thing about memories - they fade over time. Especially so if you are a ghost, or spirit, or whatever you would like to call it. Often enough ghosts will latch on to several regrets or accomplishments in their lives and develop somewhat of an obsession toward that subject. It is only after being reincarnated do these spirits' personalities shift back to something resembling their original personalities. A good example is Beryl Grace."

Miyu noticed Percy sitting up somewhat straighter at the name. "Beryl Grace? Thalia and Jason's mother?"

Miyu talked to Jason Grace before at Camp Half-Blood, but this "Thalia" was new to her, besides a few off hand references. A sister perhaps? If so, they never mentioned it.

Medea thought for a brief moment before nodding. "Yes, I believe so. From what I heard, her time in the Fields of Asphodel fading away turned her from whatever she was before into a wraith obsessed with the King of Olympus's wrongdoings against her and her poor treatment of her children." Medea took another cookie from the tray before speaking again, "It's not the best example, but it seemed to be the one that's most relevant."

Percy took a deep breath in and out before responding, "What about your own memories?"

"I remember several daggers similar in shape to the one you hold in your hand. I remember that my family forged them to conduct special rituals. I remember that I used one of the knives to kill my brother under the curse of the gods, and I remember utilizing one to break Heracles out of Hera's induced madness. From these bits and pieces I can only speculate what the knife actually does." Medea sighed, "Just don't touch the blade itself, and you should be fine. But that's not what is important. Try including the other card, but uninclude the Caster card before you do that."

Percy paused, "Um, how do I 'uninclude' this thing," gesturing at the knife in his hands.

"Just say 'uninclude,' and think about the dagger."

"Uninclude," intoned Percy. Sure enough, the dagger he held shimmered once more and formed into the tarot card he held before. Percy set the Caster card down and picked up the card labeled 'Assassin.' "Include Assassin."

Again a tarot card shimmered. The card transformed from a card into a black dagger that Percy now held in his hand.

But unlike the Caster before, something was wrong. Percy frowned as he examined the dagger.

It had an odd shape, one that didn't resemble any of the daggers that Miyu saw any demigod carry around or placed in the armory. A simple blade with a notch in the blade that ended in a hook. The handle was also oddly shaped, curved with a rounded protrusion. It dawned on Miyu that unlike the Imperial Gold dagger that she herself carried, the one Percy held in his hands was made for throwing.

"Alright," said Percy after a minute of looking the dagger over and placing it on the coffee table, "What's so special about this particular knife."

Medea sighed, "It's not what is special about it, but what is ordinary about it."

Percy blinked, "So what?"

It was Miyu who responded. "It's perfectly ordinary, no special properties whatsoever."

Percy glanced at Medea, "Are they supposed to be super special weapons?"

Medea hesitated, the first time she seemed to be unsure of herself during the entire conversation. "Well, they are supposed to be. But this is only the second card. Maybe the card holds some other secret."

"Secret?" pressed Percy.

"It's still all hypothetical," said Medea, "But we believe that there is another way to use these cards."

"There is?" asked Percy. Miyu merely held her breath, already knowing the answer.

"Well it is hypothetical after all. We need more data to support it."

Miyu was apprehensive at that. More data? For a magus, that term could mean any number of things, such as "collecting more 'samples'", or as simple as "conducting more experiments."

Percy also seemed wary. Evidently he didn't appreciate the term either. "What do you mean by that?"

Medea smiled, "The next Class card will appear in exactly one week. However, the location that the card will appear is... complicated, and we would like your help to secure it."

Percy looked at Miyu, seeking some kind of answer. Miyu hesitated, before giving a terse nod.

Percy sighed, "Swear on the River Styx that you will extend your oath to not harm us by two weeks."

"Of course."

* * *

 **Camp Half-Blood**

Reyna gazed at the new ship from the Big House's 2nd floor as the _Kympoleia_ that sailed past the beaches of Long Island Sound.

It was enormous.

In comparison, the Argo II was, well not exactly a technological marvel, but was nevertheless astounding. It was roughly 50 percent larger than the typical triremes used by the Greeks at 61 meters long. But although the ship was large, it was designed to carry only a handful of passengers at any given moment. With two large ballista, many crossbows along its sides, as well as a bronze cannon, the Argo II was a powerful weapon.

But not enough.

The weapons of the Argo II were designed to fit on a relatively middle size ship, and so the designers were only able to fit moderately sized weaponry on it. The Argo II did do the jobs that it was designed to do, but in other areas it was sorely lacking.

The weapons on board were capable enough to take on monsters and giants, but sorely incapable of bombardment and against giant monsters without enormous risks. Even the single bronze cannon proved ultimately not as effective Leo hoped. The ship could fly, yes, but in doing so wasted copious amounts of magical energy from its energy source: the Golden Fleece, which put Camp Half-Blood in peril on multiple occasions. The ship could potentially ferry dozens of demigods, but was only ever designed to have at most two dozen passengers.

In other words, the design of the Argo II was simply inefficient for the work put into it. It was ultimately a success, but judged too cost inefficient to produce results the Roman Senate wanted.

Currently, the main threat to both demigod camps were various monster camps that still plagued the Americas, mostly on the coastal regions. Those camps contained monsters numbering in the hundreds and were excellently fortified. Launching an attack that contained anything less than 200 or 300 demigods would result in failure, and even then battles could go either way.

But even then, the demigod camps' main goal was Delphi, the temple of the Oracle. A fortress with hundreds, perhaps thousands of monsters guarding it. Capturing it was imperative to both camps: Prophecies, as useless as they seemed sometimes, often enough were vital to the survival for both camps. And the _Kymopoleia_ was designed to take it.

Almost 3 times longer than the Argo II, it was a testament to the Cyclops' and automatons' construction abilities to construct something of that size so quickly.

And today was the day that the new ship was to go through its sea trials. To celebrate, an enormous fair was held at the Camp. Demigods and their parent, Legacies, nature spirits, and even some monsters were all allowed to attend. It filled the Camp past its intended occupation, and the forest was filled with tents for the overnight stayers. All to celebrate the launching of a ship that symbolized the unity between the two demigod camps.

"Truly impressive, isn't it?" asked Chiron from behind Reyna.

Reyna still couldn't quite get used to the centaur. For her entire life, Reyna pretty much lived without parental guidance or supervision. Sure, there were adults at Circe's Island, but Reyna was still allowed to do whatever she wished as long as she finished her tasks for the day. The discovery that the Greek demigods had a literal parent figure guiding them at all times made Reyna jealous. After all, as much as Lupa was a mother, there were as many ways that the she-wolf goddess wasn't truly a mother figure. Other Roman demigods, or more accurately legacies, typically had family at New Rome teaching and guiding them. Even Jason, who 'officially' joined the Legion at the age of 3, had a parent figure who took care of him before he left to turn his full attention on the 12th Legion. Reyna on the other hand, had to go through Camp Jupiter with only herself, and a few friends from the 2nd Cohort as support.

"I'm still wondering how the Senate and Camp Half-Blood managed to rack up enough funds for this audacious project." replied Reyna.

After all, projects like the 5 ships that the camps planned to build costed money. After all, the resources to build them weren't cheap, the labor force notwithstanding. The Argo II reportedly bankrupt Camp Half-Blood so much that the demigod camp weren't able to afford to build fortifications against the Romans. The Romans in contrast were already in massive debt from the Siege of Mount Othrys, having owed loads of money to the Amazons and King Midas. Fortunately, King Midas was mysteriously assassinated by an unknown party (though it seemed that the elders in New Rome thought otherwise), and New Rome was able to pay off a significant portion of the debt owed with the Imperial Gold relics that came with the weapons that the quest to Alaska brought back.

The thought that in a way New Rome owed Gaia in some way absolutely sickened Reyna, but war was war, and wars have to be paid for.

"Well," Chiron chuckled, "the private investors obviously think that they can make some serious profit by funding the construction of the new warship."

Reyna tilted her head. "How?"

"Monster lairs are famous for containing hoards of treasure and relics. Perhaps the investors hoped they could recover enough relics from the wight barrows in the North Eastern Seaboard and Northern Europe. It is certainly possible. The largest wight barrow discovered by treasure hunters in the House of Life was reported to be ten times as valuable as the tomb of King Tutankhamen, and contained an extravagant amount of scrolls and magical artifacts." Chiron said.

Reyna frowned. That was true, but...

"But that wouldn't be able to realistically pay off all the debt,' interrupted Rachel Elizabeth Dare, "Would it?"

Another source of jealousy in the form of the Oracle of Delphi, but this time it was a sentiment that wasn't only shared by Reyna, but also by New Rome in general. After, besides the occasional mystic or minor Oracle, the Romans essentially had to 'make-do' with old records, trying to match quest to quest, prophecy to prophecy. Often enough, most Roman Praetors and Senate members chose to do away with the traditional prophecy and centurion system, only bring them back to suit their own political agenda like Octavion and his followers when Frank Zhang was chosen to lead the quest to Alaska.

"No it wouldn't," said Chiron, "And that's why most of the investors are hoping to recoup their investments mainly in the expedition to the Mediterranean and perhaps later the Bermuda Triangle."

Rachel brought her hand to her jaw in a thinking posture, "Forgive me for my ignorance, but what could be in the Mediterranean that would be so valuable enough to pay back their investments?"

This time it was Reyna who responded, "Ruins. There are tons of ruins in the Mediterranean. Some of them are Greek, others Roman, and many others as well. The Argo II recovered artifacts from a secret underground workshop and the _Athena Parthenos_ in Rome, a legendary sceptor from Diocletian's Palace, and various valuable spoils of war during their voyage. They also apparently witnessed many other artifacts that they chose to let. There are so many more other treasures to find. Maybe another _Athena Parthenos_ statue in Istanbul or perhaps Venice. The body of Alexander the Great. There are perhaps thousands of relics under Italy or Greece we still have yet to discover. Maybe even an Eagle."

"Ah." For a moment the three stood silent watching the _Kymopoleia_ sail away. "But isn't this a bit much for an expedition for discovery?" asked Rachel.

Chiron shrugged, "We said the same thing about the Argo II, 'Isn't this a bit much for a quest?' Yet even when taking the safest possible routes, the Argo II was almost lost multiple times before reaching Greece. This time we are purposely taking the most dangerous route, so that requires a 'bit more' than last time."

At those words Reyna could only think back to her voyage across the _Mare Nostrum_ with her Pegasus Scipio. Fending off _Venti_ , driving away Stymphalian Birds, escaping from a Nemean Lion, getting attacked by Centaurs, and finally the attack from Gryphons that ultimately doomed her Pegasus, one of the only three companions she had for a long time that she could unconditionally trust. No one else had earned that for Reyna, not Jason, not Percy, not even _Hylla_. And yet she was forced to grant her faithful steed a quick death rather than one that was slow and painful.

As the _Kymopoleia_ charged away into the ocean blue, Reyna could only say, "I hope it will be enough."

* * *

 **AN: Really sorry about the delay. Junior year is starting, and I needed to focus on my education, not to mention a SAT II test that is coming up soon (eek).**

 **This chapter took a lot of time to get write, since I am having trouble writing Miyu, as this Miyu is not the Miyu from Kaleid due different character interactions and other factors. Also, since this is mainly an in-between chapter, not a lot is happening. Sorry about that.**

 **Anyway, a lot has happened since I last posted. In Fate Grand Order, Epic of Remnant Chapter 3 came out, and I really should get to doing it. Okeanos in NA also came out, and I was much better in finishing that quickly in comparison to the new chapter release in JP. The Halloween event for NA should be starting tomorrow too, though I am not going to try for Tamamoe-no-Mae. Sorry, but I just don't have many Arts based servants to use you to your full effectiveness.**

 **We also got new info on the Assassin Class Card. Apparently it isn't a single servant, but rather a collection of all the Hassans. Each installer seems to get a random permanent Hassan, but to the almost guaranteed disappointment to some of you guys, no, I am not using King Hassan in this story. Too HAX to really incorporate into this fic. Oh, for some added context: the House of Life and the Enclave haven't really discovered if installing the Class Cards are even possible yet, just like how the Clocktower couldn't figure it out either in the Kaleidverse, even when one of the people sent out to find more of the Class Cards (cough cough Tohsaka) really should've figured it out by now (but then again that could be explained away by the universes being different and whatnot).**

 **If you like this fic and would like to see more, please Favorite, Follow, and especially Review. It really is something special as a writer to see reviews written by you guys, and the discussions that emerge from them can be eye opening and fun. It doesn't have to just be compliments, send in criticisms as well. They really make our day.**

 **See you guys in a month (I hope).**


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